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lemissingmask · 1 year ago

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[ID: Sketch of Jacob Stone bursting into flames, with his exposed arm and hand on fire already and sparks around him, and an expression of pain on his face. End ID]

Day 26: Curse

vampire!Stone dealing with the curse of vampirism and bursting into flame when someone accidentally opens the back door and lets in daylight.

Ficlet (to be honest it got carried away and I don’t think it’s in ficlet territory anymore) below the cut. This carries on almost directly from Dehumanization prompt fill.

There’s one more loose end I need to wrap up for this vampire!Stone series

It was a trick. It was another of the vampire’s sick games. Or his mind was messing with him. It had moved on from hopeful hallucinations to nightmares.

Jake wasn’t here.

He wasn’t in the annex, and he wasn’t looking at the empty space where he should have been in a mirror he knew so well. A mirror he knew worked and he knew he should be able to see himself in because he had so many times before.

Jake couldn’t be here.

He was still in that dark, cold cell, waiting for the vampires to come back and feed on him again. Any moment this nightmare would fade to reality and he would see his own blood on the floor beneath him, a ghost of his reflection in it.

This nightmare just needed to stop soon.

It really needed to stop, and Eve needed to stop feeling so real and solid behind him, holding him up when he knew it was only those chains holding him up. They were his only support and he needed to wake up and return to them and end this.

But he wasn’t.

Jake wasn’t waking up, and Eve was still behind him, Cassie still in front of him, Ezekiel behind her.

They were talking but he didn’t hear.

He had to wake up.

He tried to pull away from them. To escape this lie.

He fell, but he never felt his body hit the floor, and not from the chains. Eve was still there and she had caught him and the nightmare wouldn’t end.

Jake tried to get away.

If he could get back through the back door…maybe that would wake him up. Maybe that would bring him back to the familiar cell and the feedings, and vampires didn’t feed on other vampires.

But he couldn’t get free.

There was Jenkins too, holding him steady, and now he knew this had to be a trick from the vampire because there was a sudden sharp pain in his arm, like a bite. Not much pain, but it was there and it was sharp. It had to be a fang, so he knew it was a lie.

He was still in that prison.

Jake was still human.

Eve had been standing behind Stone, already supporting most of his weight, so it took almost no adjustment to catch him when his legs suddenly gave way.

She had been prepared for it.

She had not been prepared for the tears she saw rolling down his cheeks, cutting paths through the blood spattered over his skin, nor for him to weakly try and get free of her arms.

And she had definitely not been prepared for Jenkins to kneel on his other side and suddenly inject him with something that looked unsettlingly like the sedative they had used on the saw-toothed moth when it had gotten loose a few months ago.

“What the hell Jenkins?!” Ezekiel yelled, “He hasn’t had enough stabby already?!”

“It’s just a sedative,” Jenkins replied not quite with his usual calm, “It should keep him out for a few hours.”

Eve nodded shakily, “That’s good. He was panicking and making his injuries worse. This way we can keep him alive until we get him to a hospital.”

“We can’t take him to a hospital,” Flynn said solemnly.

He was the only one standing away from the group, watching them, his expression as grave as Eve had ever seen it.

“Why not?!” Cassandra had caught one of Stone’s hands with her own, “We tell them it was an animal attack or something…use a spell to…”

“We can’t take him to a hospital!” Flynn snapped back, suddenly in motion. He grabbed Judson’s mirror and set it down beside them, tilted so they could see Stone’s reflection in it.

Or, where Stone’s reflection should have been.

“We can’t take him to a hospital,” Flynn repeated more gently, “Because he’s a vampire.”

“No,” Eve breathed, shaking her head, “H-he’s not…”

“He is,” Flynn let the mirror lay flat, crouching and looking back at Stone.

“Well we gotta do something!” Ezekiel looked desperately from Flynn to Jenkins, who only shook his head.

“There’s nothing we can do.”

“You stopped me from becoming a werewolf!”

“Lycanthropy does not require the afflicted to die!” Jenkins snapped back, then managed to master himself, and added solemnly, “Mr Stone has already died in order to get this far into the transformation. It cannot be reversed now.”

Cassandra whispered a heartbreaking, trembling, “He died there?” that was drowned out my Ezekiel’s voice, desperate and angry.

“We have the entire library! We can’t just give up! There has to be something we can do!”

“There is,” Eve wiped the tears that kept brimming in her eyes, “We support him. We help him through whatever comes next and we make sure he knows this is still his home. He’s still a librarian.”

“Eve’s right,” Flynn said, “We can’t stop this but we can still help.”

“What about the sanctuary? Estelle might be able to help…”

“No! He belongs here!” Ezekiel bit his lip, “Besides he doesn’t trust easily. We’re the only ones he does trust.”

“So we get him to his room,” Eve said, “We patch him up, do what we can, and prepare for…for whatever comes next.”

“Cassandra,” Flynn moved in position to help Eve carry Stone again, “Look into spells that can be used to keep a vampire contained without harming them.”

“We’re gonna lock him up?!”

“We’re going to contain him until the initial inevitable blood lust passes and he has control of it, and speaking of which, Jones, you need to go steal some blood.”

“Steal some blood?! Seriously?! We’re just gonna let this happen and…” Ezekiel cut himself off, or maybe just couldn’t figure out the words to say.

“Yes, from a blood bank. Look for AB blood types. He’s going to need blood to recover, and to stave off the cravings. It’s like a…”

“So we have a plan,” Eve interrupted what she could see what an impending ramble, “Cassandra, spells to safely contain vampires. Jones, rob a blood bank. Flynn, Jenkins, with me.”

Direct, clear action was good. That’s what they needed. They needed things to do so they didn’t have to think. Think about the fact that Stone had died in that dark, cold, dirty cell, alone but for his tormentors. The vampires who had done this to him.

The sedative Jenkins had given him seemed to be working. Either that or he was still human enough to be completely struck down by the severe injuries and extreme blood loss.

The transformation hadn’t gone far, according to Jenkins. He had only just been turned, which meant if they had got to him just a bit sooner…

Stone didn’t move, didn’t stir at all, as they removed his clothes and cleaned the dirt and blood from his skin.

In doing so, they revealed wounds horribly deep and ragged and layered - bite upon bite and flesh torn deeply into, cloth from his shirt and jeans caught inside, in some places on his wrists bone visible…

But, there were signs of some already starting to heal, his body knitting itself back together, and the only wound that hadn’t even started that yet was on the right side of his neck. That must be where he was fed on most recently.

That had to have been the one that finally killed him, drained what was left of his life away in that dark, cold, squalid cell, while he was chained to the wall, unable to defend himself or do anything to stop it.

Eve was furious. It wasn’t right and he wasn’t fair, and they should have been able to save him in time. That was their job. To save people from threats like this, and they couldn’t save one of their own.

She had killed two vampires in that place. She wished there had been more so she could have taken them out too. Got some sort of revenge.

Not that it would help. It was too late now.

Without an outlet for her rage, Eve fell to despair, and her eyes brimmed with tears again.

Being turned into a vampire aside, what Stone had been through was horrific. Traumatic was an understatement, and he had suffered all that alone while they failed to find him day after day.

Other than Jenkins giving instructions on helping him with bandaging and cleaning, none of them spoke. Eve doubted she could have even if she tried, not without it coming out as a sob.

When finally it was done and they had him cleaned, bandaged, and dressed in his favourite flannel lounge pants with van Gogh’s sunflowers embroidered crudely on - a gift from Cassandra when she got herself a sewing machine - he might almost have looked normal.

Like he was sleeping after a rough mission, and the bandages hid normal injuries, not the bites from multiple vampires and the one bite that killed him.

“How is he?” Cassandra poked her head in through the doorway, grimacing as she glanced to the adjoining bathroom, now decorated with his blood from their haphazard medical treatment.

“Still out,” Eve replied, looking from the door and back to Stone, “But we’ve done what we can for now.”

There was a pause. Silence.

Ezekiel cleared his throat before speaking, his voice cracking on the first attempt before he managed to get it under control, “Well, I stole from a few blood banks. Ones well stocked, so they shouldn’t miss a few packs. Left it all in a cooler in the annex.”

“And I found a spell that should keep him in here, if that’s what we really think is best,” Cassandra continued, “Just need to paint a few sigils around his door and infuse them with an incantation. It’ll be like a window. He can’t pass it but it won’t hurt him.”

“Okay, good. Do that,” Eve said, “And when he wakes up, we give him…we see if he wants…”

“We give him one of the blood bags,” Flynn finished for her, “Which he will need.”

“We do it two of us at a time. One with a sedative on hand in case he becomes violent.”

“But it’s still Stone,” Cassandra argued, “He wouldn’t hurt us, and treating him like…”

“Like a monster,” Ezekiel finished when she broke off, “That’s not gonna help.”

“Do you imagine he would ever forgive himself were he to harm one of us?” Jenkins argued, “He will not be entirely himself. Not until he has mastered this. Colonel Baird is right. We need to be prepared for the possibility of his growing violent.”

Jenkins’ warning made sense, but at first Stone didn’t grow violent at all.

He wasn’t even really lucid for the first few days, but he wasn’t really their Jacob Stone either.

He drank when they brought him some blood. Always barely awake and only a few small sips at first, but then he lifted himself up a bit, grabbed to hold the bag and drink faster. Desperately.

On the sixth day, he grabbed Flynn’s wrist and tried to drag it to him, but he wasn’t strong enough to maintain his grip. They realised later that Flynn had a paper cut, a tiny slice, not too deep, but that had to be what Stone had wanted.

On the seventh day, he was sitting up in the bed when Eve arrived, leaning back against the wall and picking at the bandage on his left wrist with a right hand that looked to be bleeding.

Eve stopped outside the door, watching for a moment.

“This real?”

His voice startled her. It was rough and quiet, but it was the first coherent sound he’d made since they got him back, and she wasn’t prepared for the wave of mixed emotions when she heard it.

“It’s real,” she replied, stepping into the room with Ezekiel half a step behind her. She paused when she caught sight of the shattered mirror in the bathroom, and now his bloody right hand made sense.

She made a mental note that someone needed to clean that up later. Maybe make sure there were no mirrors in the room at all.

Stone’s head raised as she drew closer, eyes taking on that alert sharpness that she had grown used to each time he caught the scent of the blood they brought.

“How’re you feeling?” she asked, but he wasn’t listening. His eyes were fixed on the bag she held in her hand.

“Stone?”

No reply, and a tensing of muscles like he was about to move.

She quickly back stepped, shoving Ezekiel back through the door and practically falling out of it himself when he launched himself from the bed after her, stopping abruptly at the door.

He fell back against the desk behind him, gripping it tightly and looking as exhausted as before, the brief moment of energy gone.

But his voice was still almost strong as he growled, “Give it to me.”

“Calm down first,” Eve forced her voice to remain calm and unaffected by the sight of her friend so painfully not himself, “Get back into bed. You’re still too injured to be up.”

There was a low growl that sounded utterly inhuman, and Stone continued to glare coldly at her.

It hurt. It hurt unbearably, but she knew what she had to do.

She just couldn’t.

“Haven’t I suffered enough?!” Stone yelled, “I need that!”

“Not til you calm down you don’t,” Ezekiel shouted back.

“We’re trying to help you,” Eve said more gently.

“Help me?” Stone laughed bitterly, “You’re tryin’ to help me? You coulda done that by leavin’ me there! You think they’d have tortured me like this?!”

The vampires had tortured him for almost two weeks. She wouldn’t put it past them.

“We’re here to help our friend, not the vampire! And until we see our Jake Stone again, we’re not giving you anything.”

Ezekiel grabbed the blood bag from Eve and turned, storming away.

“Baird,” Stone pushed himself off the desk and fell against the blank space of his doorway, “Eve. Please.”

“Ezekiel’s right,” she replied softly, stepping closer, “All the things we found suggest it’ll be easier for you to control this early on then trying to do it later. And…”

“Go away,” Stone growled, glaring up at her, “If you ain’t gonna help then leave me the hell alone!”

The shouted words cut right through every wall she had managed to build up.

Jacob Stone didn’t shout. Almost never. Maybe in a heated debate about art or architecture, but rarely even then. He spoke softly, chose his words carefully.

And this creature in front of her wasn’t the same person.

Swallowing down the lump in her throat, Eve turned and walked away.

“He’s like an addict,” Ezekiel was saying when she reached the annex, “He’s not acting like himself now, but he’s gotta still be in there.”

“The blood lust is making him act on pure instinct,” Flynn nodded, “But we have all seen vampires who have control over that.”

“We know it can be controlled,” Cassandra nodded, “And Stone had the self-control to hide his passions and who he really was from everyone he knew for like two decades. If anyone can do it, he can.”

Jenkins hummed thoughtfully and went to retrieve a book, “And perhaps that passion is how we help get through to Mr Stone…this is the book he was reading before he was taken. He spoke of a paper he was considering based on some arguments made by its author on art as a reaction to imposition by…”

He waved a hand.

“Anyway, the point is, if we can trigger the man we know using his love for art and literature, we may be able to better help him master his condition.”

“We should give him a while to calm down first. He looked ready to kill.”

Cassandra slapped Ezekiel’s shoulder, “He wouldn’t kill us.”

The thief shook his head, “Shoulda seen the look in his eyes.”

“Ezekiel’s right. Jenkins and I will try in a few hours.”

It did work.

It took some time, but before Eve went to bring the blood, Jenkins put a chair outside the door and discussed the contents of that book with Stone, a conversation that gradually began to really sound like him again. When she brought the blood, he was enough himself to be repulsed at first by the idea, and only show that feral expression for a few minutes while he drank, and briefly after it was empty.

After that, whoever brought him his small portion of blood on a given day went armed with something that might get through to the man they knew.

A quote, a book, or maybe a photo of a newly discovered piece of art or architecture, and little by little, their Jake emerged from the feral vampire, and not once did they have to sedate him.

It took almost three months to feel like it really was their friend again, during which everyone else necessarily kept up with the library’s work. Three at a time, either Eve or Flynn taking Stone’s place, and always at least two in the library to make sure Stone continued to improve.

But he did and if it wasn’t for him being locked in one room, or for the fact he preferred drinking blood to beer, Eve might have been able to convince herself nothing had changed.

“We’re thinking of removing the sigils,” Cassandra said one morning as she and Eve sat in the room with Stone while he slowly drank through the blood they brought that day, now in a beer bottle since it was more familiar and normal to him, “So you can get out of here.”

She gestured to the room, which had become filled with books and art portfolios and printed pages, and even his laptop which he never turned off or let the screen darken on, somewhere among them.

He was writing a new paper. His third since his confinement, the isolation and torment to his mind driving him to never want to stop reading or writing or analysing.

He looked up sharply from the picture he’d been examining, “No!”

“Stone, we’re not going to leave you trapped in here. We want you back out with us, as a librarian.”

“How the hell can I still be a librarian?!” he snapped back, the sudden ferocity making Cassandra jump and Eve shift between them.

Stone didn’t miss the movement and he laughed bitterly, “You’re scared of me. An’ you should be. I ain’t human anymore. I ain’t safe to be around any of you. Specially not loose. Out there. The hell happens when I lose control an’ kill some innocent person on a job, or even you?! Assumin’ I can even leave here at all. How many jobs the clippin’ book send us on that happen only at night? Hm? How many? None! I ain’t a librarian anymore an’ you gotta stop tryin’ to pretend I am! You shoulda just left me in that damn place!”

“Stop it!” Eve yelled, louder than Stone’s desperately broken rant and louder than Cassandra’s barely contained crying, “Stop!”

“No!” Stone growled, his fangs bared.

“Yes!” Eve stood, taller than him and not backing down.

He might fight her, but Eve had to believe he wouldn’t really try to kill her, and he was still not fully healed so Eve knew she would at least be able to protect Cassandra.

If it came to that.

But it wasn’t going to because Jacob Stone was still there and he still had the same self-control he had always had. He just had more stuff to control now.

“Be quiet and listen!” Eve continued when Stone made no move, neither backing down, nor attacking.

“You are still a librarian. Nothing is going to change that. Yes, things have changed, and it’s gonna take a while to figure it all out, but things have changed before, and we worked through it. Together. And that’s what we’re gonna do this time.”

“You’re not alone,” Cassandra added quietly behind him, “We want to help you.”

He shook his head, stepping back and dropping back to sit on the bed, “Why? I could kill any of you if I just lost it for just a second. I ain’t useful enough for it to be worth…”

“It’s not about being useful. It’s about us caring about you,” Cassandra said softly, “And nothing is going to change that.”

“What she said,” Ezekiel affected to be casual as he stepped through the door, “Plus we don’t know about all those silly little poets and painty guys you like so much. I sure as hell don’t want to hafta start learning to tell the difference between Cococo and baroque.”

“Rococo,” Stone corrected automatically and in a very familiar way.

“Whatever. Point is, we need you.”

Stone looked away but Eve could still almost see every emotion he was trying to bury and hide.

“Stone,” she sat down on the desk chair opposite him, “Do you still want to be a librarian?”

“‘Course I want to,” Stone whispered with tears glistening on his eyelashes as he closed his eyes, “It’s all I wan’.”

“Then you need access to the whole library, so we’re going to remove the barrier. We trust you.”

He nodded, “Could you just…just gimme a minute?”

They did.

They gave him twenty.

Cassandra removed the barrier on their way out and they went to go and try to look in the clippings book. See what weird stuff was going on.

They all made an effort to act normal when Stone finally joined them, looking almost like his old self, save for the hints of tiredness and slightly self-conscious unease. It was a bit awkward, but it was progress.

Things were going to work out.

Things were working out.

Sort of.

At least, everyone was pretending they were.

The library seemed to be aware, and really it almost certainly was aware, about Stone’s condition. His personal clippings book gave him jobs that he could do at night, enabling him to still be part of the team, and still be a librarian. But he did it almost entirely alone.

The main clippings book still had weird stuff that came up that needed daytime investigations, or which took the librarians into places or situations where there might be too many people for Stone to handle this soon. He was on edge and jumpy and Eve was almost certain he was suffering from trauma after all he had been through, on top of everything else.

He was being distanced by his curse, growing depressed, and distancing himself more.

But they tried to pretend it was okay, and Eve wasn’t sure why but she didn’t know how to escape that loop of false positivity. They were falling apart, and not for the first time.

When this had happened before, there had been a trigger. Something or some machination of the library or someone brought them back together.

She shouldn’t have waited for it to happen, but she did.

The trigger happened when Stone was up one morning, doing research on an artifact that needed retrieving from Norway. Something to do with salmon, Eve guessed, by the printed etchings on one page of the open book. The other page was a language she didn’t recognise, but presumably was among the several dozen Stone could read.

The moment was calm, almost felt normal. Her, Jenkins and Stone working at the central table, Flynn playing chess with Excalibur on the balcony above…

Then the door opened.

The back door, bringing Cassie and Ezekiel back from their job, and with them a shaft of sunlight. The door remained open longer than it should have, the artifact they had being large, carried between them. It held the door open, let the sunlight fall in the room, and illuminate Stone.

Within a second his exposed skin where the sun hit him ignited, bursting into flame.

Eve grabbed her coat from the stool beside her and flung it over him, shoving him away from the shaft of sunlight. At the same time, Jenkins’ lab coat was thrown over him too, and a few moments later water that Flynn had managed to acquire from somewhere. All while Stone was screaming in pain and Cassandra and Ezekiel were trying to get the artifact inside and shut the doors.

Finally the sunlight vanished, the fire was out, and Stone was left trembling violently, holding his severely burned arms away from his body.

For a moment he stayed there, staring at the injuries that on a human would have be bound to scar and take months to heal. Then in a blur - a literal blur of colour and unfocused shape - he had vanished out into the corridor and probably to his room.

That was the trigger that forced them to accept things weren’t working, and spur them into actively putting everything else on hold to find a fix.

They worked all day and all night, and part way through the following day, each taking breaks for sleep when they couldn’t go any longer.

They went through every magic or scientific or historical manuscript or rumour they could find that might have some solution to the sunlight problem. There was that mineral from the sanctuary, but that wouldn’t last more than a few days, and Cassandra didn’t believe the exact duration could be predicted. It could wear off sooner, without warning.

Layers of clothing and parasols and maybe some super strong sunscreen were also proposed, but nothing seemed viable.

At one point or another, they had each gone to check on Stone, but he had told every one of them that he wanted to be alone.

Except Jenkins, who was still with him when Flynn let out a shout of victory.

“I have it!” he thrust a book into the centre of the table, “Or, part of it.”

They all leaned over to look at the photograph of an old, worn scroll spanning both pages.

Eve raised an eyebrow, “You’re going to have to explain.”

“Well, okay, it’s only part of a solution. But here, this spell can protect those afflicted by a curse from external factors causing the curse to harm them. The external factor is the sun, and so this should stop it from interacting with his whole vampire thing and so the sun won’t harm him. Like a sort of shield. Or something. In theory.”

“That’s an awful lot of doubtful qualifications…”

“So, only part of the spell is here, but maybe we can fill in the gaps based on other spells from the same culture.”

“Okay, but magic needs power, focus and effect,” Cassandra mused, “The effect is the protection, but what’s the focus? I mean, the spell but we’d have to tie it permanently to Stone.”

“And how do we get enough power to do something like that?” Ezekiel added, “I’m guessing if it was easy, loads of vampires would do it.”

“Most vampires don’t have the library so would never have found this spell. Or the part of it…anyway! We translate this, fill in the gaps and work from there.”

“The focus!” Cassandra brightened, “The markings from the monkey king’s staff! They have magic already. That’s how we found Stone in the first place. Maybe we can extend them. Use them to bind the spell to Stone.”

”Guys,” Ezekiel interrupted, “We’re talking like he’s gonna agree to this.”

“It could be a way for him to be able to go in the sun again. He could go on missions with us again…”

“You’re suggesting practically carving a spell into a guy who never trusted magic, and trusts it even less now.”

“We used magic to find him.”

“Which he said he doesn’t think we should’ve done.”

“That wasn’t him!”

“Okay, guys,” Eve cut into their argument, “Ezekiel has a point. There’s no point going further into this until we ask Stone if he’s okay with this.”

“We’re also going to need him to translate the spell…” Flynn pointed out, “I mean, I could given time and maybe a bit of leeway for the occasional noun misplaced…but Stone knows this language. He’s translated texts in it before.”

They fell silent for several minutes, Cassandra finally breaking it quietly, “If we all go ask him together, he might feel pressured.”

“So one of us does it.”

Eve knew it fell on her. She was the guardian, and this was a job for a guardian.

She stood slowly, dreading what this question alone might do. Stone had become something he hated and they were about to offer him a small respite from that curse, using something else he hated.

Knocking on the shut door, she heard Stone’s voice from inside, “You don’t need to be so formal, Baird.”

She took a deep breath and opened the door.

Stone and Jenkins were playing an old Norse game, one she didn’t remember the names or rules of, and the pieces laid out on the leather board meant nothing to her.

The worst of his burns had been bandaged, but the less severe ones were still visible on his arms and neck and one side of his face. Already they were better than when Eve last saw him, probably thanks in part to the beer bottle of blood beside Stone on the table.

It looked like a calm moment. Companionable and pleasant. And she was about to ruin it.

“We have a plan. An idea of how we might be able to protect you from the sun.”

Stone looked up, and now Eve saw what she had feared. Exhaustion and despair barely hidden, Stone’s mask worn threadbare by the months of this curse and the torture that led to it.

“Alright,” he said softly.

“You haven’t even heard what it is.”

“It doesn’t matter. Things can’t stay as they are. I’m a burden to you all and to the library, and…”

“Jake…”

He shook his head and continued over her argument, “An’ if there’s a way to change that, I don’ care what it is. I’ll do it.”

He paused, looking directly back at her, “But if it doesn’t, you gotta stop tryin’ to help me.”

Eve didn’t want to agree to that. Agree to give up, but there was an expression of sadness so deep in Stone’s eyes that she found herself nodding, silently consenting to give up on him if this failed.

Stone didn’t seem happy, merely resigned, as they worked out the spell they needed and how to carry it out. But the work of translating various texts from the same era occupied him enough that Eve saw him look at least contented. Just not happy. And he never really smiled, not properly.

And now, after days of work, and a very painful few hours of Cassandra verbally burning sigils into his skin, extending the markings all down his right arm, they were ready to try.

“You sure about this?” Stone asked, for probably the fifth time, “‘Cus you know, spontaneously burstin’ into flames ain’t that fun.”

It hadn’t been fun for them either.

Sitting out in the open in Shangri-La, two fire blankets within easy reach, Eve feared the psychological consequences if this failed, more than the physical ones.

The night sky was already lightening.

Any second now the sun would breach the horizon and cast its rays onto them.

They didn’t move, barely breathed, as the first sector of the sun was seen, orange and warm, stretching over the mountain but not yet reaching them.

It extended.

The light hit their feet first, and Stone instinctively flinched although his boots protected him there.

Eve watched him.

He didn’t close his eyes.

He watched intently as the sun rose further, tensed as the light touched his exposed forearms.

A wince. The marks now extending down the entire of his right arm glowed red, sizzled, then settled back to black.

The sun rose further, bathing them in light, and no fire.

None of them spoke until long after the sun had fully escaped the horizon. Just in case a sound in that perfect morning would break the spell.

An hour, two hours, and still the fire blankets remained untouched.

Later they would repeat the test, outside of the magic city. Even if it worked, they would still never go out without at least one fire suppression method close at hand. Just in case.

But the spell had worked, at least in this moment, and Eve had felt a warmth far deeper than the sun could ever gift at the sight of Stone smiling, really, genuinely, smiling, as he turned his face to the gentle glow of the early morning light.

#ailesswhumptober2023 #Day 26: Curse #the librarians #jacob stone #cw fire #cw flames #vampire jacob stone #cw blood #cw torture #masks whump art

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bluewavesofchange · 5 months ago

Text

The guardians of the Pharaoh

Sea and shadows: the Queens of the abyss.

I don't own Yugioh or it's characters

No warnings for the chapter.

Chapter 3

While Lillian was once again thrown into yet another life threatening event for the third in 24 hours, everyone else had started to awaken. Taking in their surroundings and trying to figure out where they were. Téa gets attacked and captured by a group of Hitotsu-Me giants, Tristian and Duke find some axes to try and chop their way out of the hallway they were trapped in, Joey was wondering around aimlessly in the endless corridors of the castle he was stuck in, Serenity gets chased by some kind of dinosaur, Seto and Mokuba somehow end up in front of the orphanage they were left at after their parents passed away (more on that later) and Yugi well…he ends up at a pond and is confronted by one of the Big 5; Gansely to be specific who had taken the form of the Deep Sea warrior…because of course that’s normal.

Rozu had wondered around this strange world after awakening, whatever this was it was strange…nothing was real and yet it felt as real as the human world, it was a maze of moving landscapes and duel monsters…it felt almost like her home world…and yet it wasn’t. She felt no life here; everything was artificial with no soul…we except for the handful of human souls that were trapped here…7 of which had peaked her interests. 5 were nothing more than powerful men that had fallen from grace and become nothing more than lost souls in this virtual prison. The other was a little boy heal bent on revenge and the other…the other stayed hidden in the shadows, watching everything unfolding from a distance.

She didn’t know who he was but she could sense the depravity that festered in his spirit, the wickedness and narcissism that littered his aura and the sadism that bled through his mind. It reminded her of her father and that just made her bristle with anger. She would enjoy ripping him to pieces and feasting on his soul…not that she cared who he was, she just hated things that reminded her of her father.

But he was difficult to find, hidden deep in the bowls of this place. She would have to wait until he made himself known…for now she went searching for the pharaoh and his little lover boy. She stayed in the shadows as she watched the once mighty Atem struggling against a fish man and was that a Kuriboh busy trying to help him? She hadn’t seen one of those puff balls in years…they were her first creation after her father had passed. They were sweet little balls of darkness that were meant to keep her company and entertain her (in all honest they were failed attempts at flesh devouring beasts that were meant to eliminate the last of her father’s servants and followers and she just couldn’t find it in her heart to get rid of the cuddly little pomp pomp’s).

She had a whole hoard of them before she left the monster world…she wondered if any of them were still alive.

She watched as the Pharaoh struggle to defeat the fish man, a smirk forming on her face as she watched him get his by an attack and fall to the ground. A few shadows emerge from the darkness, one of them moving up her arm and nuzzling her cheek before moving up to her ear and whispered softly, “I suppose you’re right. We should help him out. It doesn’t help he dies before we get the chance for revenge…I want to hear him scream and beg for mercy as I pull his spirit apart bit by bit…” the shadow disappears and Rozu fades into the darkness…

Yami didn’t like what was happening, why do they always seem get dragged into some kind of nonsense involving Kaiba? This had nothing to do with them and yet here they were forced to duel (because that’s the normal thing to do in this universe) to keep their bodies from being taken by 5 ex-executive men (yes…that’s what’s going on here. The sentences this story makes me write).

After waking up in this virtual world he had to watch as his little angel search for his friends before being confronted by Gansely, one of the big 5 and forced into a duel, Yami taking over to face the fish man. The duel’s new Deck Master aspect was interesting to say the least…Kuriboh ending up as his somehow…he was annoyed at first because what could this hair ball do to help him. But Yugi managed to convince the spirit to give the small monster a chance and so he did, putting his faith in his deck master.

But he was struggling with this duel; Gansely’s deck was impressive to say the least, his attacks getting redirected back at him and ever blast was like a punch to the gut, the last burst of energy knocking him to the ground. This wasn’t good, he needed to come up with a plan or else both he and Yugi were gonna be stuck here forever…

He felt something hairy nuzzling his face, Yami’s eyes opening as he grunted, his body aching from the blast. He was met with a face full of Kuriboh, the little creature looking worried as he kept trying to nudge the pharaoh to help him stand. Yami somehow gets to his feet, he looked at Kuriboh and gently ruffled its head, the monster purring softly before his eyes widened, his hair standing up everywhere as tried to hide under Yami’s jacket, obviously seeing something that frightened it. Yami was nearly pushed over by the small beast, grabbing hold of it as it was flailing around, a frown on the teens face. Yugi comes out of the puzzle and floats beside Yami, ~What’s going on with him? ~ He asks the spirit through their link. The pharaoh glances at the other, ~I’m not sure. He just started freaking out. ~

He keeps trying to calm Kuriboh down as Yugi notices the water in front of them starting to bubble, the grass around the embankment dying and spreading fast. ~Yami look! ~ He alerts the pharaoh who turns his attention to wilting vegetation around them; the death reached the trees, crawling up the bark like an infection, the leaves catching fire. Gansely was look around bewildered as the water beneath his feet had turned into black boiling ooze, steam rising from the gunk. He tried to reach Noah to ask him what was going and if there was an error in the system or something.

Noah received the man alert and pulled up his screen, raising a brow when he saw what was happening to the area where Gansely and Yugi were duelling. What the heck? He leaned in to get a closer look as red error message started flashing over the screen as the image starts glitching. The letters start to morph into an evil looking face that laughs at him before the image goes black. Was this the virus that had invaded his system?

Yami pulls Kuriboh into his arms to protect it as he activates the puzzle to pull Yugi’s transparent form back into it to keep him safe from whatever was going here…he could feel a darkness approaching him, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end as he searched around for the source of this evil, Kuriboh making distressed noises. Gansely glares at the spikey haired teen as more trees and plants catch fire as a raging fire surrounds them, “Is this your doing?!”

Suddenly the bubbling ooze explodes with black steam, filling the area and darkening the space, Yami and Gansely covering their eyes with their eyes to protect their vision from the hot gas. They couldn’t even see what was in front of them anymore.

All that could be heard for a moment was a hissing sound of the steam and the crackling of the fire burning down the surrounding woods. Yami was starting to have trouble breathing as the smoke and steam was filling his airways, a horrible cough starting to wreck him, Kuriboh looking up at the teen, his eyes filled with concern for the teen as he collapses to his knees, holding his neck as he tries to breath. Yugi could see what was happening to his partner and was panicking as he couldn’t get out of the puzzle to help him, Yami keeping Yugi inside the safety of the mystical item.

Within Yugi’s soul room he was banging on the door trying to get out as he could Yami’s soul fading slowly. He is aware of the flames surrounding them and the smoke inhibiting the pharaoh. The short teen needed to do something, he couldn’t lose Yami like this again but there was nothing he could do…

Gansely lowered his arm and tried to see through the dense steam and smoke when he hears a soft humming coming from within the darkness…seeing a shadowy figure slowly approaching him. He gets into a defensive stance before the silhouette slowly become clearer as his breath is nearly taken away…before him stood a tall woman dressed in a black revealing dress, her skin was beautifully tanned, her red hair flowing behind her like streams of a smooth wine, her golden eyes glimmering in the darkness like the sun, her arms covered in strange markings, her curved hips swaying as she walked, her toned stomach on full display, the bindings holding up her breasts just barely containing them and her lips blood red framing her perfect white teeth as she smirked at the man.

She slowly approached the man who was transfixed by her ethereal beauty, if he wasn’t a dignified man he would be drooling right now. Her skin looked like caramel and he wanted to taste it. She stopped just a few feet from him, raising her hand and motioning with her finger for him to come to her. Not even questions how such a woman could be here or even why, Gansely runs over to the goddess, entrapped by her trance. He stands before her as she towers over him, her breasts in line with his face. He wants to reach out and touch them but doesn’t as he didn’t know if he was allowed to even gaze upon her. She leans down, her hands on his face as he removes the weird helmet he was wearing exposing his face.

He doesn’t realize that he has fallen deep into her trap as she grips his forearms and moves them to rest on her waist, her fingers tracing over his duel disk, finding the clasp and unlocking it, letting it fall to the ground, effectively eliminating him from the duel. Gansely can’t take his eyes off her and is about to lean in for a kiss when a shadow shoots out of the water and wraps around his throat, squeezing it tightly. Two more grab his arms and more entrap his legs. He starts to struggle as the pupils of the woman’s eyes turn to slits, her mouth open to reveal elongated canines, the sides of her cheeks splitting open as her jaw unhinges like a snakes. He watches in horror as she slowly grows larger, a hiss leaving her throat before she laughs, diving in and silencing the scream that leaves Gansely’s lips, swallowing the man whole.

Yami vision was getting blurry with tears as the smoke and heat from the flames was burning his eyes as he couldn’t to struggle to breath. He thought to himself if this was what Yugi had to suffer through when he was rebuilding the Millennium puzzle in the middle of the burning building. But unlike last time he wouldn’t let Yugi suffer, he would take the pain and the torment as long as it meant that his little angel wouldn’t suffer. Kuriboh as still trying to help, forcing himself under Yami’s arm to get him to stand to guide him away from the flames and smoke but the pharaoh was too weak to stand…

Yugi kept banging against the door, tears streaming down his face as he could feel how the other was suffering, he was screaming at the top of his lungs for Yami to let him out but there was no answer…Yugi’s hands were shaking and red from slamming into wooden door…emotions of fear and terror filling him…sparks start to fly from his fingertips, his amethyst eyes glowing brightly as he lets out a desperate cry as his body explodes in a great big ball of light, filling the puzzle with its blinding glow.

A beam of light shoots out the eye of the Millennium Puzzle, lighting up the area as figure small figure emerges from the ancient relic, standing before Yami as a set of large white wings spreads for the persons back, giving a hard flap, sending a gust of wind through the space, blowing away the smoke and steam, extinguishing the flames.

Yami is panting heavily as he is no longer threated to be suffocated by the polluted air. His vision clears slightly as his sight is meant with something truly breathe taking…there before him stood Yugi glowing with a gentle light, his normally tri-coloured hair was now completely golden, a halo circled his head, his clothes were pure white and a set of the most beautiful wings he had ever seen was gracefully moving behind the boy…he truly looked like an angel…his perfect little angel that had saved him yet again.

Yugi’s eyes slowly opened, meeting the others gazes, the purple hues of his pupils were a swirling pond of magical energy. He floats over to Yami and holds out his hand, a soft gentle smile on his face. The spirit takes his hand his body becomes engulfed with a glowing light, restoring his strength. He’s able to stand on his own as Kuriboh is chirping with joy as he bops around both the boys.

Yugi giggles softly as he watches the creature being so happy, meanwhile Yami could not take his eyes off his Aibou and how beautiful he looked in this moment, he reached over and caressed his cheek, returning Yugi’s attention to him. The boys stare deeply into each other’s eyes as they lean in closer, their faces so close that they could feel the others breath against their skin, their lips just a so close…but the light around Yugi fades as his angelic wings disappear and he returns to normal, the boy passing out into Yami’s arms, his body becoming transparent again.

Rozu didn’t have much time to enjoy her meal as she was blown back by a gust of wind, being knocked back into the blackened water, the boiling liquid burning her skin (not that it bothered her, she’d been through worse). She growled as she sat up quickly, scanning the area for what had attacked her, only to freeze and her eyes widen when she caught sight of Yugi…he looked just like her sister in this moment. She knew that both Yugi and Heba possible had some of the goddess of lights powers but this…it was like he had basically taken the roll of this other worldly creature…he had taken her sisters place…

This was not good…if he could tap into that unbridled angelic power and learned how to use it, he could seriously harm Rozu…and possibly destroy her…she needed to be careful and change her plans…if she wanted to get to Atem, she needed to find a way to deal with Yugi. She needed to learn more about this boy and what the reach of his power was. The shadows slowly surrounded her body slowly became smaller as it shifted.

Yami holds Yugi close, worried about his little one as his spirit felt weak. Yugi whimpers softly as he looks up the other, ~Are you alright? ~ The spirit shakes his head as he chuckles, ~You can barely stand and you’re asking me if I’m alright? ~ Yugi pouts as a small blush forms on his face, ~ You nearly died! And you kept me in the puzzle! ~ He tears up as Yami smiles softly, ~ And you saved my life once again. I am forever grateful for you my little Aibou. ~ If he could kiss Yugi he would but he was remind of another problem as he helps the shorter teen stand, looking around at the ruined landscape, his eyes landing on the space where Gansely had stood, only to find the spot empty. Where did he go?

Before he could do come up with a thought, both boys heard a little girl crying somewhere. Yugi decided to take over and searched around, following the sound, eventually finding a smouldering tree near the edge of the now polluted water…and there sat a little girl with curly red locks wearing a frilly long sleeved dress, knee high socks and buckled shoes. She was hugging her legs to her chest hiding her face in her knees. Yugi slowly approached the girl, wondering where she had come from and how she got there, “Um…hello?” he speaks softly but the girl still jumps when she hears him, looking up at him with frightened eyes, “WH…who are you?! Stay away from me!” she looked at him with big brown eyes as she gets up and backs away

Yugi stops and holds up his hands, a soft smile on his face, “Hey its ok. You don’t need to be afraid of me.” She didn’t look convinced but he kept calm and kept talking, “My name is Yugi Muto. What’s yours?” she sniffles softly as she wipes the tears from her cheeks, “Ro…Rosie.”

“That’s a nice name. How did you get here Rosie?”

“I don’t know. I was out with my mom when we were attacked by some guys and next thing I knew I was waking up here and my mommy was gone.” She starts crying again as Yugi took a few steps towards her and kneeled down in front of her, resting his hand on her shoulder, “It’s gonna be ok. I’m sure your mommy is around here somewhere.”

~If that’s the case then she’s probably burned to death by now.~ Yami said in a snarky manner as he looked at the little girl from his place beside Yugi. Something about this didn’t feel right…something about this little girl was off. She could be a trick from Noah and his goons because seriously how did a child end up here and have survived that inferno when Yami barely survived and better yet where was Gansely?? Yugi glared at the other, ~That’s rude.~ he pulled his handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to the little girl, “Here you go.”

She carefully takes it and cleans her face, “Th…thank you.” Yugi smiled as he stood up, “You’re welcome. Hey my friends and sister are missing too. Maybe we could look for them together.” He needed to find them, he feared for what dangers they could be in, especially his wounded sister…

Rosie nodded slowly as she lifted up her arms, Yugi bending down slowly and picking her up, the little girl wrapping around him to hold onto him, “You’re really nice.” she giggles softly as the short teen chuckled and blushed softly, Yami rolling his eyes at this. He didn’t like this child…as if hearing his thoughts she looked in the spirits direction, her eyes flashing gold for a moment before returning to normal. Yami frowned and was about to say something when a path seemed to form amongst the burnt trees, clearly showing them where to go…

Noah finally got the screen working again and to his shock the landscape was destroyed and both Gansely and Yugi were missing…

Meanwhile the Kaiba brothers were taking a trip down memory lane…they were standing in front of the horror house that was the orphanage they were sent to years ago…they watched as they were dropped off at the gate, left there to rot while their family stole their inheritance money…

Seto watches the younger versions of themselves are taken inside the building by the caretaker. He gazes around at their surroundings, the details that this virtual world was capable of was immaculate. He could even smell the dust and decay that was imbedded in this god forsaken place.

His eyes land on a group of children that were watching their younger selves…seeing a familiar face…all the other kids leave but one stayed…a little girl dressed in a worn out lavender coloured sweater, her raven hair blowing in the wind, her blue eyes fixed on the two of them before she turned and walked away. She may be younger here but he knew it was Lillian, he never forgot the day they met and the sad loneliness that plagued her eyes…

Seto and Mokuba followed the pathway leading to the back of the orphanage and watched at the next scene unfold…they saw little Lillian sitting by herself on a bench while the other children were playing, watching as some brat with a baseball bat and his cronies harass the girl, grabbing her and shoving her to the ground before a younger Seto comes to her aid, hitting the bully and chasing him off…The brunet didn’t know what drew him to her that day, at first he always believed it was because he didn’t like seeing a defenceless girl getting attacked by a group of assholes but he knew there was a deeper reason…something that drew the two of them together…

He watched as the younger version of himself took out his handkerchief and cleaned the scrape on the little girl’s cheek, their eyes meeting…suddenly the scene changes…

Its night…the brothers find themselves on the steps of the museum…a hard wind is blowing as thunder and lightning rages in the background…Mokuba is confused as to why they were here before his gaze lands on another version of his brother standing in front of Lillian…the two were shouting at each other…Seto felt his heart sink…he knew this moment all too well…

“For heaven’s sake no you don’t!” a bolt of lightning flashes through the sky, “You don’t need to be the best, not for your brother, not for me, not for anyone. It’s what you’re step father wanted and right now you’re acting just. Like. HIM!” Seto saw red when those words flooded his ears…images flooding through his mind, words, insults and a cruel laugh echoes in his ears. He saw his step father standing in front of him, smirking at the teen…the brunet wanted this to stop as he shook, and raising his fist…

Mokuba can’t look away and flinches as he watches his brother strike his girlfriend out of anger…

Another bolt cracks in the air as a second later Lillian is on the ground, slowly sitting up as she was held the side of her face, pain spreading through her cheek. It happened so fast, one second she was standing and the next she was on the ground. She looked up at Seto, he was breathing heavily as he had a nasty snarl on his face, his fists clenched at his sides.

He glared down at her…how dare she say such a thing to him! He wasn’t his step father! He wasn’t that monster that robbed him of his childhood and stole his innocence! He wasn’t—

His eyes met Lillian’s, seeing the tears forming in her eyes, the skin on her cheek bone starting to turn red beneath her trembling fingers. His breath caught in his throat, his eyes slowly widening as he comes to his senses. His anger quickly turning to dread as he realizes he had struck her…he had hit the girl he loved, he had let his anger and ego over take him and he laid his hand on the person that had been consoled him when his father had beaten him…he paled as he saw the fear in her eyes, a fear he knew all to well only this was worse because it was someone she loved that had hurt her.

The moment mirrors the couple’s first meeting only this being a much more horrible version of it…

He reached out towards her, wish to help her up and comfort her, “Lil I’m—“ she didn’t let him finish as she smacked his hand away and got up quickly, rushing to her bike, not bothering to put on her helmet as she started the engine and drove off as fast as she could. Thunder rumbled above the city as the first drops of rain fell over the town, Seto still standing where Lillian had left him…devastation setting in as the rain poured down, soaking the CEO as he stares in the direction his beloved took off in before looking down at his hands which were shaking, “What have I done?” he whispers to himself…

Seto watches her drive away as the rain starts the pour, Noah’s voice echoing around the them as he laughs, “My my Seto, I knew you were a piece of work Set but this takes things to a new long.” Kaiba’s fingers curled into a fist as his trembled both with anger and hatred, at who wasn’t clear, whether it was at Noah for throwing this moment back in his face or at himself for one of the worst moments in his life. “But then again all you do is cause the people in your life pain and suffering…” Mokuba looks up at his brother, reaching up and resting his hand on his brothers forearm, Seto looks down at his brother and he slowly calms down, “No you don’t big brother…”

He didn’t understand what was going on or why this was happening to them but he would stand by his big brother and defend him every step of the way…because that’s what family does…and because he knew that Seto regretted every one of the horrible things he had ever made in his life and made up for them by taking care of both him and Lillian...

The scene changes at they are back at the orphanage, the brothers standing in front of a window, watching as their younger selves were playing board games, chess to be exact, Lillian was sitting with them as Seto was trying to teach her how to play. Seto watched the cute little expression on her face as she concentrated, her lips in a soft pout and her eyes narrowed…she had the same expression even today when she was focusing hard on something...

He watches as she loses the game yet again and the younger version of himself playfully taunting her, the girl glaring at him as he rests the board and they go again while little Mokuba watches…she’s about to lose again but grabs little Seto’s queen, the little boy frowning and tries to grab it back. She keeps it out of reach and sticks out her tongue as she stands up and runs off, the kid chasing him as Mokuba laughs at their antics…

This was one of Seto’s fondest memories…a day where they goofed around and messed with each other, where they could play and just have fun while being themselves. However this day was special for another reason…

On that same day a family had come to the school and were impressed by Seto and wanted to adopt him but when he asked if he could bring Mokuba and Lillian with, they shook their heads…saying that they didn’t have enough money to take care of 3 additional children…this was one of the reasons Seto had come up with the plan to get adopted by the bastard Gozuburo and leave Lillian behind…sure he had money but he wouldn’t risk the man refusing him by involving another child for him to adopt…

After the family left with another child Mokuba had run off, heading to the park where the brothers use to play when their parents were still alive…Lillian and Seto had gone to find him, finding him exactly where the older brother thought he would be. Mokuba had taken the death of their parents very hard and even though the accident had been a few months before, the wound was still fresh…he missed his mom and dad…the holidays they would take, birthdays, Christmas’s…he missed his mother’s smile, the chicken noodle soup she would make when they were sick or her roast duck and vegetables on cold winters days or how she would tuck both boys in at night and sing to them…and their father, how he would pick them up when they got hurt or play with them in the backyard, the funny faces he would make during dinner time and the bad jokes he would make when they were sad to cheer them up…

While Mokuba took the loss hard, Seto had buried those emotions deep down, believing he needed to be brave for his little brother, to take the role of parental figure in the small boy’s life because all the other grown-ups had failed them both. He never properly grieved the loss of his parents and never thought of them as those emotions were locked away so far in his heart that they were untouchable at this point…to Seto there were only two people who were his family and that was Mokuba and Lillian…

The brother’s watched as they 3 kids were walking along the peer, heading back to the orphanage, little Seto trying to cheer little Mokuba up, trying to reassure him that everything was going to be ok but it wasn’t working…little Lillian took another approach…she grabbed the small kids arm and dragged him to a wooden staircase that led to the beach. Little Seto chased after them, asking the girl what she was thinking…she smiled at him and the only things she said was ‘beach day’. And sure enough that’s what they did…

The little boys had stripped down to their underwear while Lillian kept her shirt and shorts on. The 3 kids playing and splashing around in the soft, gentle waves that were crashing into the shore, their laughter filling the air as they kept trying to dunk each other in the water. As the sun was setting they sat on the beach to dry, Lillian ask if Mokuba was feeling better. The boy nodded but said that he still missed his parents. Seto said that it would be ok and that they were a family now…this surprised Lillian as she looked at the boy in shock. He simply smiled and said that he would be the day, Mokuba the child and Lillian could be the mom that cleaned the clothes and dishes and cooked dinner. Her face went red with rage and embarrassment as she got up to grab the boy and shake him but he got up quickly and ran off as he laughed, Mokuba watching the two of them as he got up and giggled as he chased after Seto too.

And true to Seto’s words from that day, the 3 of them were still a family…a little damaged and hurt but a family none the less. Mokuba looked up at his big brother, “You still kept your word from that day big brother…” he smiled at the teen who simply nodded as he continued to watch the scene in front of him till lightning flashes across the sky and the scene changes again, Noah laughing, “Some family you have their eh Seto. Especially when you keep abandoning them and letting them get hurt.”

The scenery changes and the boys are in Seto’s office the day he left after losing to Yugi…he is shown how his brother is taken by Pegasus’s men…the scene changes again to Battle City and how both Lillian and Mokuba were taken by Marik…his brother hanging out of a helicopter and Lillian’s necklace being used to taunt him by Lumous.

He reaches into his pocket and pulled out set necklace…staring at the pendant as Noah snickers, “You just can’t seem to protect the things you hold most dear…”

The scene changes again to duellist kingdom…replaying the events that transpired that fateful day…

Eventually she found the cells, relieved she rushed over to the one holding Mokuba. The boy looked up when he heard her come in, “Lillian!” she rushed over to the bars, “I’m here kiddo. Your brothers here too.” She started to look around for a set off keys. Mokuba was overjoyed; his brother was here to rescue him. However his joy was short lived as when the alarms went off in the tunnels, “Shit.” Lillian mumbles as she finally finds a set of keys and heads over to the cell, trying to rush to unlock the cell door.

But just as she was about to get it open, 3 guards come running in. Lillian manages to grab her combat knife from her boot and tries to fight them off, she stabs one in the leg, slices another’s arm and kick’s another in the stomach. She tries to get to the gate to get the youngest Kaiba brother but is grabbed by the man she kicked, he has his arm around hers pinning them to her side. She tries to kick and squirm but the man has a good grip on her, “Let her go!” Mokuba shouts as he tries to get to the bars but is held back by the chains around his ankles.

“I don’t think they will Little Mokuba.” She stopped struggling as she hears a familiar voice, seeing Pegasus enter the room, “You.” She snapped at the game maker as she kicks back, nailing the guy in the groin. He groans as he lets go of her, she picks up her weapon and charges at Pegasus but she is grabbed again, this time by the two men she had wounded. Each one had a grip on her arms, forcing her to her knees. She glares daggers at the white haired man, “You going to let your lackey’s do all the work?”

“Well that’s what they’re paid for. Take her to the viewing room and make sure she’s secure. This one’s a fighter.” Pegasus ordered as he approached the girl, leaning down to sneer at her gloat as she reached for the back of her neck, unclasping her Blue Eyes necklace, removing it from her person, “I’ll be needing this.” She spat in his face, glaring at the man as he pulls out a handkerchief to clean his face. He nods at the men as they drag Lillian away, “And make sure you get yourselves taken care of. You’re fired if I find a single drop of blood on my rugs.”

It’s strange how all these people used this necklace to torment Seto…a thing that was held over him whenever Lillian was taken from him…it was a special gift between the two of them, a symbol of the bond between them and the trust they had in each other. And every evil person that makes their way into Seto’s life used this symbol against him…

Tears started streaming down her cheeks as Pegasus sips his wine, “Well it would seem this is the end for you my dear…I just hope you don’t make too much of a mess…” he smirks as the man puts his finger on the trigger…this couldn’t be the end of her…this couldn’t be the end of her love…there had to be something she could do…slowly some of her tattoos started glowing as well as her eyes just like before…

Seto closes his fingers around the pendant as he starts shaking again…a burning pain starting to emit in his side...Noah continues to taunt him, “Ever wondered if she would’ve been better off without you? If Mokuba would be better without you?” his laugh echoes through the air as the scene goes back and the brothers are back at the orphanage, their younger selves sitting on the swing sets on the playground with Lillian, “Just image what a better life she would’ve been without you…”

Seto looked at the young version of Lillian, the happy carefree smile on her face…no fear of people trying to hurt her to get to Seto…she had nearly died twice now to two maniacs to torment him…the pain he was feeling grows worse as he grunts, moving his hand to his side…what was going on?

He looks down at the pendant and the sapphire eyes glow, the heck? He hears…Lillian’s voice calling out to him…calling for help…the pain becomes too much, it feels like his on fire, his organs burning as he falls to his knees, gripping his coat as he clenches his teeth, breathing heavily…

Mokuba is at his side the instant his brother keeled over, but before he could do anything, Seto lets out a scream of agony and the world is engulfed in a white light…

When the light fades both brothers are laying passed out on the ground…and Lillian’s necklace was missing from Seto’s hand…

#yugioh #yami yugi #yugi mutou #seto kaiba #mokuba kaiba #puzzleshipping #alternate universe #fantasy #ocs #fanfic

2 notes · View notes

rookedcrow · 9 days ago

Note

[ reunion ] a longing kiss shared after being apart for a while

she can hear voices --- emmrich. taash. lucanis? lucanis!

varric ( or the memory of her friend, anyway — her head was still reeling over the revelation he’d been gone this entire time. it felt as if she’d been knocked around all over again ) had told her to listen --- not always her strongest attribute, but now seemed like as good a time as ever to try and fix it. she’s wary for a moment; afraid this is just another one of solas’ little tricks. after all, he’d already seen to it she had to face bellara and harding for the choices she’d made; seen lucanis’ body laid out motionless and cold at her feet … why not rub a little extra salt in the wound? ------- but the voices sound different; they sound clearer the closer she gets to them. they aren’t coming from the prison, they aren’t there to castigate. and when she hears lucanis say ‘rook!’

..... he’s alive?

“here! i’m here!” she shouts without knowing if they can hear her; the fact that the conversation on the other side of the distortion carries on as if they can’t sends a painful jolt of panic through her. let me out, let me out! she doesn’t have the dagger anymore, and she certainly doesn’t have a drop of magic flowing through her veins … i need to get out!

if she has to figure out a way to claw through the veil on her own, she will. she moves towards the voices, scurrying up a staircase that looks brittle enough to crumble and send her plummeting into the unknown below again if she so much as puts one foot out of place. “i’m here! emmrich? taash?” she takes a moment to look back over her shoulder --- back at where she’d left varric behind again. one more chance to say goodbye ------ before hands and arms begin to reach through the fade for her. the shouting gets louder; conversations overlapping one another as she hears someone yell ‘pull!’ while another voice shouts they’ve got her...

she’s out.

isn’t she? the light here is brighter, the air feels warmer in her lungs — her first few steps feel more like a foal with it’s knees knocked together than a sure - footed assassin; she practically trips over her own feet trying to get away from the tear they’d made in the fade to get to her. his is the first face she looks for in the group; the need to make sure what solas had shown her had been a well crafted lie --- because it had been devastatingly effective. ( she’d heard his voice! that had to mean what she’d seen before had been an illusion. it had to. she’s already lost bellara ... already lost harding ... the thought of losing him too … ) “lucanis!”

arms extended, practically flailing, eager to touch him — determined to touch him — the need to make sure he’s real has her grasping at whatever she can get to first as soon as she’s able to break away from emmrich and taash. “you were dead too,” she manages to get out before her lungs run out of air; the next breath in is staccato and rough. taash calls for neve somewhere to her right, but she doesn’t follow their voice or look to see. “bellara and lace and you,” his hands settle on either side of her face briefly and she feels herself begin to fall apart ---- the anger, the grief, the fear … the relief; all of it washes over her at once as she pulls him closer by his shirt, clawing at fabric until her hands finally still themselves at the back of his neck, curling into his hair. the kiss that follows doesn’t bring to bear any of the uncertainty or despair she’d been feeling — it’s far more eager; determined. the sort of kiss that carries all those emotions along every time her teeth snag themselves on his lower lip. it feels real. this feels real. he feels real.

she’ll apologize later ---- they’ve been mindful about keeping their affections as discreet as they possibly can around the others ( though, it seems more like an open secret instead of one that’s closely guarded considering the proximity the group shares ); but for now the only thing she wants is knowing he’s real in a way that solas wouldn’t be able to mock her with. she pulls away, but only to hum against his mouth. “you’re real, aren’t you?”

@spitecrow b/c SOMEONE wanted angsty kisses tonight sorry!

#spitecrow #ic. › answered.#verse. › main.#since they failed to give us this in game #i'm giving them the immediate post reg/ret pris/on smooch they deserved demmit #and then he can go check on her later to make sure she's *really* okay 😏#death mention cw #veilguard spoilers /

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devinetheory-2 · 1 year ago

Text

The writing below is from a dear friend

I was victimized by

her riteous heaven dipped

feared respected and revered pen.

Her wand is dark magic

Heavily guarded

tragic semi automatic

emphatic charismatic distraction

She keeps coming back like elastic

I can't help but feel that

the attraction

Between our souls

and our hearts is like magnets.

All you needed was one pen

And I was caught in your dragnet

An addict that won't break the habit

I cant help it

As passion had a chemical reaction

With tragedy

and gave birth to bat shit...

And I loved with everything I had

Back then....

Thank you for being you

Unapologetically savage

And tragicly empathic

Intergalactic rabbit

And I think I'm not afraid

As I am intoxicated by her magic...

And collapse in orgasmic

fantastic compassion

Animalistic

Tender madness

I'll eat you alive

In cannibalistic fashion...

But it always ends

in poetic madness.

As all things do

That are dangerous,

fast and attractive

As I fall into her dream

Wondering what it all means

I fade into the blackness...

- Devine Theory 👆 😁

rayven-interrupted 👇

Nov 10, 2023

He writes me, so indicatively

Perfectly capturing all my tragedies

His pen is the beauty of my insanity

🖤

................................................................................................

She's watched me

descend from calamity

I can't pretend

Im not treading water anymore

Lust, lack of trust

Thick like sand

I've lost the entire world

When it was just in my hands....

I will not survive my own gravity...

And it always comes back to me

I pay for the weight of my mistakes

With these tragedies...

The hitman...

And every bullet fired is actually

Iron blasphemy

Sent from the mouth of God

With unforgiving accuracy

Ceasar watching the ones I loved

With everything in this now

Empty cavity take their justified

Stab at me

Its my own fault

As I dozed off

I chose wrong

And now my soul owes cost

my spirit begins to atrophy...

Standing at the gates of heaven

Hoping they'll have me

And God isn't mad at me

Because somewhere along

this dark and lonely road

Where you have been traveling

With your back to me

I was kinda getting used

to being someone you loved

But changed your act

And threw a toaster

in the bath with me....

(Shocking....)

And within this insantiy

we've lost our humanity

As the demons birthed

of my darkness pull at me

Grabbing me dragging me

Armed with matches and

Cans of gasoline

She tells me that she loves me

Narcissistic vanity

I try to escape its inevitable grasp

But death just rolls her eyes

And laughs at me...

While I'm chased into never

forever by my past

this fight is so old

Her essence now is so cold

And there is no limit to its savagry...

See, I've never felt like I've belonged

To this world of fake magic dreams

Where the REAL ones will die

Leaving holes inside

And their flesh just rots

for the maggots to eat.

And yeah.... She lied,

miserable little harlot star

She'd burn me down

Leaving nothing but scarlet scars

Now ive lost myself again

in this starlit dark

until I would feel like

the wrong one died

Tearing my heart apart

Just saying that

Made trauma that I cant repress

Now I beg for death

Nothing but salty tears

And anguish left

The danger is in the anger

Because I can't release

I might bury my grief

Deep into some strangers chest.

Dont look into my soul

Thats where my flames are kept

Fueled by her games

until my brain resets

Stained by the charred remains

Of regrets and her angry threats

I write about it

And pretend

some of the pain just left...

Don't judge me

This world has made me insane

my Guardian Angels have to be drained

And insanely stressed

Thinking

I should maybe rest

But I keep up the fight

Like my line

cant be pressed

But today

i just remain depressed

A prisoner....

Chained to my regret.

Dont judge me...

I played my best

- Devine Theory

#writeblrina #addictsinrecovery #spilled words #bad love #twcpoetry #poetry #spilled poetry #13cupsofteareblog #quotes #writerscreed #writeonworld #devinetheory2 #Poetryedits #Poetryreblogs

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daisylore-au · 2 years ago

Text

K2 — Tell Karl A Lie — won!! is it the best idea?? is it even a good idea?? is it a BAD idea?? who knows!! not you guys :D you’ve got another choice at the bottom, and then one last one after this before your time with karl runs out :) feel free to also send any questions you might want george to ask karl!! he might ask a few…

—

Trust? Karl’s talking about trust? George wants to laugh. God, when is the last time they’d all trusted one another? Before the Red Days, when they’d been so divided and suspicious they’d almost gotten themselves killed? Before Dream’s death? Before the prison?

(Back in the first summer of the SMP, when Dream’s laugh had brought butterflies to George’s chest and made his own face match in a sunshine smile?)

George lets the silence stretch on too long for one minute, then two.

“George?”

“I am hiding something,” George admits, “Patches came back.”

Karl’s eyebrows fly up to his hair. “Like, Patches Patches?”

“No, the fake Patches. Obviously the only Patches we know, Karl.”

“Holy cow,” Karl breathes, ignoring George’s sarcastic response, “how long ago?”

George shrugs. “Like. I don’t know. Two weeks ago? Three? I’ve… been looking after her for a while. She just… um… appeared one day. I didn’t want to tell anyone who she is just yet. I don’t know, it doesn’t feel…”

“Right,” Karl offers, when his friend falters, “I get you. I mean, I’m not gonna tell anybody, dude. Cross my heart and all that.” His smile is pale on his face, and strangely drained. “Anything else? You’ve just been acting weird for a while now.”

“No,” George says, in a rush, “nothing else.”

This time, it’s Karl who lets the silence drag, those grey grey eyes of his boring into George’s, but George stays quiet, resolute.

“If you’re sure.” Karl looks tired, but says nothing. “Well, no fear. I’m not telling anyone about Patches. Your secret’s safe with—”

At the mention of her name, Patches appears, brushing against Karl’s ankles with a busy meow. Karl’s face softens instantly, and he scoops her up, earning himself a purr almost instantaneously.

“She looks so different,” he marvels, “I can’t believe she’s still alive.”

George scoffs, warmth blossoming in his chest at the sight. He wishes Dream could see this: then remembers with a pang that Dream is probably upstairs right now, listening to the sounds of merry friends families by himself.

“She was a baby when we got her, don’t forget,” he says, “it’s not like she was seventy or something. She’s just older now.”

Patches shoots him an indignant glare at the mention of her age. George pulls a face at her.

“It’s true.”

Glancing back up at Karl, George’s smile fades. His friend is distant, the way he used to get during and before the Red Days, before therapy and his marriage and their so-called happy ending. When Karl snaps his eyes towards him, they’re empty.

“What about you?” George pesters. “What’s been going on with you?”

“I had sex with your mom last night. I’m tired from it.”

“You’re an idiot.” He doesn’t let it drop. “Tell me the truth.”

“George…”

And admittedly, does he have any room to press when he hadn’t even told Karl his real secret? George pauses. In his defence, it’s not really his secret to tell in the first place. And he’s only asking Karl because he’s worried…

you have until 3pm est to choose c!george’s next course of action!! does he…

K1. PRESS KARL FOR HIS SECRET.

K2. CHANGE THE SUBJECT.

K3. [NOT UNLOCKED]

#> daisy lore: christmas event

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kayxleeee · 4 years ago

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Loki Laufeyson:Delusions (Loki x Reader)

Warning: NONE! Slight Mean + Sad Loki

A/N: Love this one! I always feel so bad for Loki in Thor The Dark World :(

Summary: After Loki returns to Asgard he is immediately sent to prison for his crimes on Earth. Unfortunate events occur when Asgard is under attack and you just want nothing more than to check in on your beloved.

Word Count: 2k+

*NOT MY GIF* Do not copy my work

The news of Loki return to Asgard was both worrisome and exciting. There were rumors being spread about that he was returning as a fugitive for the destruction of not only earth, but the crimes that he had committed against Asgard. You of course found yourself just happy to know that he was alive. He may not had been well, but sure he was very much alive.

Living. Breathing. Speaking.

Out of all Thor’s closest friends, you and Loki bounded the most, which caused you solely, to develop feelings for him. These feelings would lead to a sever fallout between you and your warrior companions. With Loki’s criminal accusations, hate and critism came from many, especially from Sif and Fandral. For you to still think highly of him,--well you were considered a traitor in their eyes.

When he returned you were forbidden to pay him any visits. Odin also ordered that the only visitors Loki received were of kin and even those visits were kept very minimal. Now with the unbearable news of Frigga’s death you worried about his sanity even more than before.

The queen has been deceased for a few days now, Thor was easily consoled by Jane’s presents and the support of the Asgardian people who were also mourning their queen. However no one was concerned for the fallen prince, except for you. You knew that his crimes were severe, but nothing was more torturous than knowing of your mothers death and there is nothing for you to do because you are locked away without even the slightest hope of saying goodbye.

For days you try to receive information on the location of where Loki was being held. You are a warrior of Asgard, you should have known these things, but because of your so-called bias-ness for the Prince of Mischief you weren’t allowed. Your inquiries about Loki’s whereabouts in the palace were extremely noticeable and you received a lot of animosity for it, especially from Lady Sif. She called you stupid and selfish for wanting to see him. You were also accused of not having any dignity or self respect. No one would tell you directly where Loki was being held, but with enough sneaking around the palace, you finally over heard a few guards speaking of his whereabouts.

With the common criminals.

You have been watching two sets of guards for more than an hour. You wanted to slip past them undetected, but you needed to wait for the perfect moment. You weren't one of the most skilled warriors in fighting but you were known for your intelligence and abilities to be clever in any situation. The plan was for you to create a diversion to get the guards away from the staircase leading down to the dungeons. You knew that since the palace had been attacked from the inside out the guards would be on high alert. You cast a large stone, breaking a window to which the guards attention is drawn to the noise. They run into the direction of the shattering glass. As you sneak past them, the memories of Stif warning you fills your mind as you flip into the entrance running down the concrete staircase as quickly as possible.

“It’ll be the last thing you do” She threatened.

“He is a prisoner, he knows his crime.” She scoffed

“If you go to him, we will know where your loyalties lie.”

“Loki cares nothing about you, he is a man who cares simply for himself.”

You reach the bottom of the large steps, hoping you were turning down the correct corridor as you ran quickly. You notice on your way that the majority of the cells are completely empty. This worried you, but did not stop you from searching for him. You luckily reach his location without any mishaps.

“Loki!” You announce breathlessly watching as he paced around the small room with his back turned away from you.

His cell was tidy, clean as if he had not touched a single thing. He had all of his things that brought him comfort; fancy furniture, books, papers, and pens. You knew that Loki loved to read because the two of you spent the majority’s of your time together in the library. You felt at ease knowing that he at least had that. This was of course curtsy of the Queen; she asked for these items. Although he was being punished, the only thing she wanted for her dear son was that he was comfortable in his confinement no matter what he had done.

“What is it ?!” He snapped turning around to face you. He took heed in your presence and then pressed his lips into a thin line. “Ah, Lady (Y/n).” He greets you calmly, then an amused grin appears on his face. “Here to tell me the mighty King has passed on too?”

His comment took you by surprise, you assumed he would be just as grateful to see you, as you were to see him.

“Don’t be so morbid Loki!” You cut him off with offense frowning your face in confusion. “With the news of your mother passing, I would think you’d have far-more compassion for your family, for Asgard.”

“My family.” He repeats, mocking your charismatic tone placing his hand over his chest. “My Family is not here on Asgard. My family are no more than those disgusting vile creatures you fight and kill.”

“Loki I know you’re hurting, I know you have all this anger built up, but you have to know that you do have family and loved ones here on Asgard.” You say subtlety hinting at yourself. “I did not come here to be mocked.” You say in a calming voice as he walks over to you.

You place a hand on the enchanted glass as you look up to his figure continuing to speak. “I am not one for your dramatics, I just wanted to see how you were holding up.”

“Holding up?” He lets out a malice laugh. “Ha! Holding up?! I am locked in a cage like an animal!”

You slam your fist against the glass in annoyance realizing your loving reunion was falling flat. You did not come here to argue with this man, you didn’t even plan far enough to think of exactly what you wanted to say, but it was never envisioned like this.

“And who’s fault is that Loki?! Who’s fault!?” You snap matching his dramatic tone.

“My own! For trusting idiots!” He yells back and you can’t help but think what idiots he were referring to. He continues, “Why are you even down here, Odin forbade anyone from seeing me, you can’t be THAT stupid. Or perhaps you want to cast more stones?”

“Cast stones?— I came here as a friend Loki. All this worrying I did for you, all the tears and regrets. I risked my own life and freedom by coming down here” You scoff rolling your eyes at his demeanor. “Just to be spat on by you?”

“Better I to you, then you to me.” He laughs.

“That is your problem, you always think people want to hurt you just as bad as you want to hurt them! Look at you and your brother, he mourned you, we all did, and you go and do this? Destroy and take over the only place he loves. What did you gain?!”

“Oh bullshit! That place was nothing, but a pathetic little wasteland! They needed ORDER.”

“They needed no such thing Loki, YOU needed a sense of belonging.” You say with emphasis.

“My god you’re just as delusional as my brother .” He laughs.

“Delusional?!” You yell.

“Yes.” He says calmly, pleased at how angry he was making you. He walks away and sits on his couch crossing his legs and resting his arms on top of them. “D-e-l-u-s-i-o-n-a-l, delusional.”

As he walked away you noticed a single error in his walk as if it all was an illusion. Something that only someone who knew Loki would catch if they payed close enough attention.

“Enough, no more illusions Loki. Show me your true state, I know you are not this heartless. The only person who stands here delusional is you!”

With that, what you thought was the real Loki fades away in shimmers. A much sadder scene formed before you. The cell becomes a mess, with the once neat furniture, either broken or distorted across the room. The scuff marks on the walls concluded that he had thrown the furniture with immense force. His beloved books were ripped and torn to shreds, and his once neat clothes tattered and disheveled. Your eyes meet his saddened pale figure sitting on the floor near something he recently broken. Fresh blood oozes down his foot as the glass that was lodge in him is discarded next to him on the floor.

“IS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED TO SEE!? A BROKEN MAN YOU SEE !?” His unruly hair falls into his face as he screams at the top of his lungs, veins bulging from his neck.

You immediately go to the side panel that unlocks the cell, running to his aid. You kneel beside him where there is not much debris, wrapping your arms around him and pulling him into a tight hug. He barriers himself deep into your neck letting out a silent sob. You hold him close as if you never wanted to let him go.

“I am here Loki.” You whisper to him placing a kiss to the top of his head.

You have never in your seen the Prince so weak, so fragile, so upset, so venerable. This all must have taken a huge toll on him, you couldn’t imagine what he was going through.

“ I did not want this for myself, I did not want this, not for her.” He says lowly as his voice breaks.

“I know.” You rub his back softly. “But you have to know that she loved you unconditionally with all her being, Loki.”

“I-, I don’t believe that.” He sighs with a hint of hesitation in his voice. “No one could ever.”

“That should not be hard to believe because I do, I love you too, I love you unconditionally.”

“You love me?” Asked confused he pulls away from your embrace looking at you with puffy red eyes.

“Yes.” You admit.

“You surely love as a friend correct?” He questions with squinted eyes.

“More.” You place a hand on his cheek giving him a small reassuring smile. “I’ve always loved you Loki, more than a companion, way before any of this.”

He places his hand over yours, giving you a weak smile, then leans in to kiss you. You were surprised , but quickly adapted the new feeling. The kiss was sweet and slow, so slow it felt as if time had stopped. He pulls away resting his forehead against yours.

“This probably is the best news I’ve received all week.” He says with a light chuckle. "I'm so sorry."

You smile pecking his lips once more before speaking again.

“I hope you know that for me to love you unconditionally, that I know who you are deep down. I know you aren’t all bad. I know that you had your reasons for going to earth and ruining New York, just as you had reasons for all the mayhem you have created. What was it ?” You say attempting to have him open up more.

“My reasoning ?” He asked in an unsure voice. “ I do not know.” He concluded turning way to look forward as if he was thinking.

“I find that very hard to believe Loki.” You say resting your head on his shoulder, taking his hand. “But I’m here whenever you’re ready to open up.”

It was true, you never thought Loki was all bad, you knew that there had to be reasons behind his mischief and misunderstanding. A few minutes passed of the two of you just being in one another’s presents. You imagined in other circumstances, this is how Thor felt when he Jane, as if nothing else matter other than the fact that they had each other.

“It…. His name was Thanos, after I fell from the birfrost—” He finally spoke, but it was short lived.

“(Y/n)!” You hear Thor shout from the other end of the cell interrupting. He states at the two of you intensely.

“Thor it is not what is seems.” You say imagining Lady Sif would soon be on her was as well.

“You are not in trouble (Y/n), but I need to speak to my brother, alone.”

You turn your attention back to Loki and he nods patting your hand. The two of you get up and Loki weakly walks you over to the entrance of the cell that you previously came through.

“We can talk later, you know I’ll be here.” He looks at you with a knowing grin placing another kiss on your lips, before Turing to his brother.

You nod turning away to leave the two alone to talk. You had hopes that one day you and Loki could somehow be together, and finish that conversation, but today was clearly not that day.

#loki x reader #loki fluff #loki x you #loki x black!reader #mcu fanfiction #loki laufeyson #thor and loki #thor x reader #thor the dark world #tom hiddleston #tom hiddelston x reader #loki x y/n #loki headcanon #loki of asgard #tom hiddelston imagine #mcu loki #marvel #black reader x avenger #mcu bwww

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amerrierworld · 4 years ago

Text

Babysitter (pt 11)

Pt 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10

Summary: Loki and Hela come to break you out.

Characters: Hela x fem!reader, Avengers

Word Count: 2,780

Warnings: some light smut to start~ and then battle time! whoop whoop

Her cold lips pressed against the back of your neck, a firm presence in the swirling dark. You couldn’t see her, but you could feel her. Could feel her wandering hands snaking over your bare skin, making you squirm.

You could see your breath form in the cool air around you, and you were pulled back against her front, feeling her hook her legs over yours, her dark hair falling into your sight as she enveloped you. Hints of green pulsed in your peripheral vision.

“Hela,” you breathed, clinging onto one of her hands as the other traveled lower and lower. You stared up into the darkness, falling back even further into her hold, her body and soft cushions catching you. Her voice rumbled in your ear, but you couldn’t understand what she was saying.

Your eyes fluttered shut as familiar fingers searched and caressed your cunt, pushing between your folds and collecting your wetness on her fingertips. Your hips bucked weakly, as if you were caught in molasses, and you moaned softly.

One of your hands tried to reach back, felt the brush of her hair against your palm, but couldn’t find her head or her shoulders to hold onto. Your legs were still trapped, the fingers were still moving inside you, but your hands were grasping at nothingness and-

You sat up in your bed, shaking, eyes looking around and wondering if Hela could be in your room with you. But there was nothing, and no one out of the ordinary.

Sweat had gathered in every crevice of your body and you clambered out of bed to take a quick shower, trying to wash the feeling of Hela off your body, without succeeding. You didn't sleep the rest of the night.

The next day you were sitting by yourself, reading a book after lunch in a small reading room away from the main offices and training rooms where you knew the rest of the team would be.

Something crept up the back of your neck and a chill ran through your body. You tried to ignore it, but it persisted. And when you looked up from your book, Loki was standing by the doorway, looking quite unimpressed. You shrieked, your stomach dropping at the sight of you.

He raised his hand to shush you and eyed the doorway, hoping no one would come through there. You stared at him, and in a split decision, chucked your book at him.

It went straight through his form, only causing a faint green glimmer as it landed on the floor. You gaped at him and he raised an eyebrow, silently asking if you were done.

“Do you know how hard it was to find you?” Loki said after you had calmed down somewhat.

“What are you doing here?” you hissed, “weren’t you..”

“Dead? No, not quite. Almost.”

You sank back in your seat, your hand over your heart as you sighed, “what is it with you lot and always coming back from the dead?”

“It’s an occupational hazard with what we do,” he shrugged.

A pair of footsteps walked by the room, and Loki slunk back into the shadows, fading away for a moment. You didn't move until you were sure whoever it was had gone.

“Look, I don’t have much time,” Loki said once you were alone again, “but we’re here to break you out.”

“Who’s we?”

Loki rolled his eyes, “who do you think? Your murderous girlfriend who unfortunately happens to be my sister as well.”

Your heart nearly jumped out of your throat, “Hela? So she is here?”

“Of course she is.”

You sat quietly for a moment; so your mind wasn’t playing tricks on you. Hela had come back for you, and she was here.. somewhere.

“I- I can’t believe..”

“Well you better, now get your things and follow me. We can get out of here without fighting.”

“Wait- what? No, wait, wait,” you got up hurriedly as Loki began walking to the doorway. You couldn’t stop him- it was only a projection of him, but you weren’t ready to just walk out.

“Why would I just leave?” you asked, making Loki stop in his tracks. He looked you over and slowly approached you, his eyes flashing.

“Because you’re being held here against your will and she’s come to bail you out? Mind you- it was her idea to come barging in and killing anyone in sight, so this is a much better upgrade from that plan.”

“No- no I know. But.. when we get out, what then? What am I supposed to do? Loki... the world’s fallen apart.”

The Asgardian was quiet.

“Yeah, sure,” you continued, pacing from where you were standing, “I don’t like being kept here but- there’s not much else out there right now. Everything here at least feels a little... normal.”

“You can’t be serious. What about Hela then, huh? You think she’ll stay here with a team of heroes who tried to kill her? Just for you? Hela hates being imprisoned, Y/N. This would be a death sentence for all of us.”

“What about you then?” you retorted, “after you get me out, and Hela and I go about our merry way, what will you do? Tour the universe until some other evil plan comes up?

“This,” you gestured around the room, “is all I have right now.”

“No, no,” Loki mocked your gesture a bit more aggressively, “what you have is a prison, and only one person in the world who will stop at nothing to break you out of it.

“I’m not the most romantic, fine,” he admitted, “but I know that the two of you should never be apart, ever again. You should have seen her when I found her, Y/N- she was broken.”

A wave of tears threatened to spill at his words and you fell back in you chair once again. You buried your face in your hands and for a few minutes nothing else happened. Loki looked at you and felt his heart -or what was left of it- break to see you so defeated.

“I love her, Loki,” you whimpered, “I tried to deny it when Tony said so.. but he’s right. I love her, but I’m scared. This world isn’t meant for her. It would drive her mad.”

“Not with you around.”

You wiped the salty tears off your cheeks and looked up at Loki.

“Let’s get you out of here, and we can figure it out from there, okay? Perhaps we can come to an agreement with the rest of your team.”

You eventually nodded and stood up, ready to pack the few things you had when a loud crash and alarms sounded. There was a hurry of steps outside the room and when you looked, the whole team of remaining Avengers were preparing themselves, running down the hallways to the source of the noise.

“You filthy humans!” a cry came from the direction they were running towards. Your heart shattered; Hela.

Beside you, Loki’s apparition groaned in exasperation.

“I told her to wait, for crying out loud. Why would she be so reckless?”

“She takes after her family, obviously,” you said. “Can’t you get her out of here?”

“You’re a fool to think I can control her now.”

“Then get over here and help her!”

“Yes, yes, alright,” Loki huffed, “I’ll be there in a moment.”

His image shimmered away, and you hurried down the hallway, hoping to stall before anyone was killed.

One of the ground level metal walls had been torn open like it was nothing but paper. Large metal spears and knives were wedged in the edges and the opposite walls. The sun was glinting off of Hela’s horns and blinded you for a moment before you could really look at her.

She looked.. regal. Well, she mostly looked psychotic, with bared teeth and clenched hands, but it was her and she was real and oh boy was she angry.

Hela had Steve by the throat, holding him up so his feet barely brushed the ground. Tony and Nat had their weapons aimed but didn’t shoot. They were either waiting for her to drop Steve or didn't want to kill her. You hoped it was the latter.

“Wait!” you screamed, skidding to a halt at the scene. Dust swirled in the air from the debris. There were no bodies yet, and you prayed you could keep it that way.

The moment Hela caught sight of you, her face changed. Her eyebrows unfurled and her mouth dropped open a little bit- she looked at you with disbelief, as if she couldn’t comprehend you standing there, alive and well.

Steve took the opportunity as she was distracted and lifted his leg to kick her square in the stomach. She doubled over, dropping him, and he raised his arm to land a punch, but instead, Hela grabbed his offensive arm and whipped him away from her- effectively throwing him against the rest of the team, knocking them all down temporarily.

Before you could react and rush over to see if the group of Avengers were okay, Hela was by you in a flash.

Her hands trembled as they grasped yours, and she looked you up and down, checking for wounds, checking if you were there. Then she cupped your cheek, wiping away the tears you were crying.

“Hela-,” you croaked, because the touch of her was too much, too overwhelming, too good. She smiled, though barely, and kissed you hard on the mouth.

“Stand down, sister,” Thor’s voice boomed, and she turned to see the team back on their feet, aiming everything they had at her. She snarled, pulling you behind her, shielding you from them, as if they would ever hurt you.

“You’ve taken everything from me, brother,” she spat. “You won’t take this last ounce of happiness from me.”

Something flickered in Thor’s eyes and he had to retighten his grip on his hammer, which you realized wasn’t Mjolnir, but a makeshift copy that looked somewhat close to it.

“Y/N,” Tony said, gesturing you over to their side, “come here. Quick. We don’t want you in the way.”

Hela’s focus sharpened in on him, hidden in his armour. There was a surge of jealousy through her whole being, at the memory of him by your side, threatening to hurt you, sparring with you, taking you from her.

She pushed you back, hurled herself at Tony with lightning speed before anyone could shoot, breaking entirely through the next wall, and landing with a thud in the next room.

“No!” you screamed, shielding your face from the spray of debris as the wall broke down.

Hela tried to punch, but Tony’s right iron hand held it in place, arms shaking from the force. They stayed there, suspended in time for a moment. Hela lowered her face to Tony’s helmet as she growled and snapped, but he could see the tears streaming down her face, the wild fear and anger in her eyes.

“You won’t steal her from me,” she cried.

Then JARVIS finished downloading Hela’s body scan from the first day at your home way back, analyzing her form, and realizing her weaknesses. Her left side was much weaker than her right.

And so, he kicked, jabbed, and twisted her left leg and arm until she howled in pain and dropped to the side, giving Tony the chance to get up and put some distance between them again.

You felt helpless, not knowing how to stop it, not knowing what to do, not wanting to hurt anyone- you had no weapons on you. Hela staggered to her feet, the helmet having disappeared long ago, and she raised her hand to summon a new menacing sword, when someone hooked an arm around her neck and pressed a rusty dagger against her neck.

“Drop it, sister,” Loki hissed, the blade pressing finely against her skin. She hissed, but slowly let it slip from her hands as she realized defeat. You were panting, every inch of you throbbing with adrenaline and dread.

“Stand down, everyone,” Loki continued, and then with a pointed look at Thor, “please, brother.”

Thor was the first to lower his hammer, though his face was still angry and unforgiving. Then Tony, and everyone else followed suit.

Loki kicked the back of Hela’s knee to make her drop down, to which she cried out in anger.

“Sorry,” he added, the blade still pressed against her neck, “but you’ve really got to stop going on killing sprees.”

“You were taking too long,” she snapped, “I needed to take matters into my own hands. How was I supposed to know what was happening?”

“Alright, okay, anyone wanna explain what the hell is going on? Y/N? Thor? You wanna explain what your dysfunctional family is doing here?” Nat asked, exasperated.

The God of Thunder looked at you, your eyes begging and desperate. “They’re here for you, aren’t they?”

You nodded weakly, trembling.

“Well, best let her take her then,” Tony sighed. All of you turned your heads at him in disbelief. His iron armour was short-circuiting from the blows Hela had landed and he quickly stepped out of it. You were reminded once again of how malnourished he looked- and how dark the bags under his eyes were. But his tone remained chipper.

“You’ve seen what she can do,” he gestured at Hela, “and she isn’t gonna stop until she gets Y/N. And I don’t think Y/N wants to stay here either.”

He looked at you knowingly, and you felt like you could cry all over again.

Hela struggled against Loki’s grip for a moment, heartbroken as she saw your face scrunch up and your hands grasp your elbows in an attempt to shield yourself.

“Is that true?” Nat asked, staring at you with a gun still in hand.

You slowly nodded, making eye contact with Hela and not looking away. You heard Steve sigh and groan a bit from pain as he came up to your side.

“Y/N, she’s a vicious attacking machine, we can’t just let you two run off.”

“Why not?” you asked, your voice thick. “We won’t hurt anyone.”

“Look, we still don’t even know if she knows about Thanos, right?” Clint said, but Tony shook his head, sitting down on the armrest of a cushioned chair that was practically sliced in half from Hela throwing weapons.

“I doubt that,” he said, “if she had control over Thanos or any connection with him, I don’t think she would have come alone, let alone with him,” with a nod towards Loki.

He rolled his eyes, “you’re welcome for saving you, by the way.”

“Can you- could you all, please, just, can we please just talk about this?” you hiccuped through your words, sobs slowly growing in volume. “Loki- the- the knife, please- please let her go.”

Loki looked at you apologetically, “not if she lashes out again.”

“Hela,” you pleaded, “Hela, please. Don’t hurt anyone else? Everyone- everyone has already been hurt so much.”

Hela looked at you, now seeing the tears sliding down your dirtied cheeks, and her shoulders slumped, before nodding. Her hands that were gripping Loki’s arm around her neck let go, and dropped to her sides.

Loki removed the dagger and stepped away. Tension filled the room, expecting her to attack again.

“Y/N,” Thor said, and he tossed you a new pair of handcuffs. “Go on.”

You stared at him, “excuse me? You want me to chain her up- again? After everything-”

“This is more to keep all of us safe. She’d kill us if we came too close,” Thor said, pointedly raising an eyebrow at you. “It won’t be for long. Not until we figure out what to do next.”

You stumbled over rand dropped on your knees in front of Hela, gently holding her hands for a moment. She stared at you, deep green eyes watering.

“Just for now,” you promised. “Just like before, okay?”

You waited for long, agonizing moments until she nodded, and only then did you snap the cuffs in place. Almost immediately, Tony was on Loki and had his wrists in chains as well.

“Wh- excuse me?” he scoffed, staring at the cuffs, “how dare you?”

“Precautions, my friend,” he shrugged. “Come on, all of you, this mess is doing nothing for my respiratory system.”

He pushed Loki ahead of him and you followed with Hela’s hands clasping yours, rubbing your arms together, her trailing behind you like a lost puppy. You were thrilled to see her again, but wondered where the hell you were supposed to go from here.

A/N; I guess I kinda made Loki the unspoken hero didn’t I? :D

so the main reason why I haven’t been updating this series as much is because we’re at a point where multiple ideas branch off into totally different directions, and I keep changing my mind about where I want this to go, effectively stumping me when writing. but after much editing and changing of plot, this is what I’ve got, and I hope you like it :)

taglist: @midnight-lestrange @cheerfullyvenomous @germansarechill @gaylorrds @amii-nyc @waitingfortheendtocome @novakitten0901 @marvels-writings @jadewestwriter @thisisanexistentialcrisis @sapphiclyartistically

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kayecorral · 4 years ago

Text

Freight Car

Chapter One of the Brown Book Series

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Mentions of violence, PTSD (!), swearing

Word Count: 3.4k

Series Summary: Nine years ago, The Winter Soldier murdered your friend in front of you. Nine years later, Bucky Barnes shows up at your door with the hope of making amends.

⭑⭑⭑

⭑⭑

⭑

You wake up on the floor again.

In the crossfade between dreaming to waking, the hardwood is concrete against your cheek. The sweat in your hair is the slick of blood. You fade in and out, and awareness comes back slowly. A siren descends, moving closer and closer, then recedes into the quiet. You don’t know if you imagined it.

You do know that your alarm isn’t blaring. Your ringtone isn’t sounding. The birds chattering and chirping at your window are real. The steady knocking of your heart against your ribs is real. Maybe that’s enough.

You open your eyes. A sliver of light from the parted curtains cuts across the floor. Above it, dust dances in the still air. All is calm. If you had woken up in your bed, this would be a good morning.

But you didn’t wake up in your bed. So, you peel yourself off the floor and half-walk, half-limp to the bathroom. As you cross the threshold and flick on the light, a face flashes before you. Before your mind can work to discern its features, you slam the door shut and flip the switch. You cry in the dark.

⭑⭑⭑

You call into work again.

You’re tempted to stay where you are—curled in on yourself under the covers—but Dr. Kaplan’s gentle voice prods from inside your skull. “Trauma changes over time,” it says. “You have to face it as it comes. You’ll feel worse if you put off dealing with it.”

She picks up on the second ring. Judging by the sound of clinking silverware, she’s on her lunch break. You promise to keep this impromptu session short.

“I haven’t had a nightmare like that in a long time. That’s why it hit me so hard, I think.” You begin. Your eyes fill with tears. You don’t know why. The nightmare is so distant now — just bits of feeling. Your brain is scrubbing away the memory like a mounted defense.

You’re quiet for what feels like minutes, and Dr. Kaplan just waits. She doesn’t pose a question or make a suggestion: in other words, she doesn’t offer an out. She never does. At first, her silence and seemingly unending patience unnerved you. You would later understand the value of having the space to organize your thoughts before speaking them.

“I thought I was doing better,” you eventually say. “But now, it’s like I’m back where I started.”

“You are not back where you started,” she says. “We haven’t talked about your night terrors in months when we used to talk about them every session. That’s incredible progress. You should be proud of how far you’ve come.”

You hold the phone away so she can’t hear the tears in your voice. “But what does it mean? ”

“Well,” she pauses. “Have you been thinking about Jean lately?”

“Kind of,” you start to say, then remember Dr. Kaplan’s rule about specifics. “I’ve probably thought about her… twice in the past week. Marie, she, uh, she sent me a Facebook request.”

“Did you accept it?” She asks, with just a hint of amusement.

“I haven’t. I don’t know if I should.”

“Why not?” Dr. Kaplan asks. She knows the answer, of course. You haven’t spoken to Marie since the funeral nearly a decade ago. You know she resents you. You saw it in the tightness of her smiles and the way her eyes turned to stone as you stood before Jean’s casket. You’re alive and her sister isn’t. You understand that. What you don’t understand is why she would reach out to you after so many years.

“I’m afraid of what she’ll say,” you admit.

“It wasn’t your fault.” Dr. Kaplan says. You shift on the couch. “She knows that. Maybe she’s been thinking about Jean, too.”

“Yeah,” you respond simply. Your head is light from dehydration, and you should probably take a nap at some point.

“I’d recommend you take easy today…”

“But?”

“But next week, I’d like to hear about your Facebook convo.”

You smile. The tears have dried on your face.

⭑⭑⭑

Snippets of dialogue filter through your thoughts. A woman is talking about a missing child, and a detective is asking the “who, what, where”s. It’s an episode you’ve already seen, but it makes for good background noise: the dramatic stings, the fast-talking, the screech of tires as the driver peels off. You don’t know why you gravitate towards crime shows. It might be a bit morbid, but until now, you’ve never thought to mention it to Dr. Kaplan.

You’re almost done with the cake batter. It’s looking a little watery, though. You really should have followed the recipe instead of improvising.

You reach for the flour bag on the counter, and just as you raise it to the mixing bowl, someone knocks at your door. You jolt and the bag slips from your hands. You narrowly dodge as it plummets to the ground. It lands with a thump and now, your feet and pants and floor are covered in a film of white powder.

“Fuck,” you breathe.

There’s another knock, a bit louder this time.

“Give me — give me just a minute!” You call out, voice frayed.

You step over your mess and towards the door. You notice how slick your hand is on the doorknob, so you wipe your hands on your pants and try again. You forget your ritual of checking and re-checking the peephole. You unlock the door, already anxious at the idea of keeping anyone waiting.

When you finally swing the door open, a tall, dark-haired white guy is staring at the carpeted hallway floor. He’s not looking at you, but you feel exposed in your flimsy tank top and flour-splattered pajama pants.

Meanwhile, his look is carefully nondescript: a leather jacket, a dark shirt, and jeans. His hands are stuffed into his pockets and his shoulders are slightly hunched. He looks like someone who doesn’t want to be seen, but here he is, standing at your door.

Maybe he’s just a neighbor on a reluctant mission to convince you to turn your volume down. Maybe he’s a dealer at the wrong address. Maybe he —

Your stomach drops. The shadows had been obscuring his face, but now that he’s tilting his chin up to look at you… the broadness of his forehead, the color of his hair, his height, all these things pull together. They pull tighter and tighter around your heart, and you realize that you’ve seen this man before. You’ve seen him a thousand times.

Your hand flies up to your neck. Fear hits like a punch to your gut. He looks normal — so normal that you could convince yourself that it’s not him. It’s not him.

But now, his eyes — a startling shade of blue— meet yours. Cold washes over you as every sensation in your body amplifies. You feel small and weak. Your vision starts trembling at the edges. You can’t move — not even to release your breath.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” he says. His voice sounds so different from the one in your memories. It’s not as coarse and low, it’s gentler and higher-pitched. “I just wanna talk.”

“Talk.” The word escapes you, but you hadn’t meant to speak. Hearing your own voice makes this real.

He clears his throat. “My name is James Barnes, and I’m no longer The Winter Soldier.”

The Winter Soldier. You suppose it doesn’t matter now what that means. If these are your last moments, you’re not going to spend them deciphering code. Instead, you think of your life and all the things you’ve done and all that you haven’t done. In the span of moments, you try to make peace with your death.

“If you’re going to kill me...” you can’t keep your voice from shaking, “do it.”

His eyes widen. “I’m not here to kill you. I’m — ”

“Hydra wants to know what I know. Is that it?” Your mind reels with the new theory.

His eyebrows tick up. “Hydra doesn’t exist anymore,” he says with a measured tone. “Not really.”

You don’t know how to respond to that divulgence. You don’t even know if you can trust it.

“I’m here because you,” he adds your name — your real name, “are part of my efforts to make amends.”

Your thoughts catch on how he knows your name. It’s a small thing, really. He knows where you live, after all.

“I know you’re confused, and I know you have questions.” He reaches up to scratch his neck. “And if you’re not, ah...” he glances from your face to your body, as if he were just now noticing your state of dress, “comfortable talking here, we can talk somewhere public. I guess what I’m asking is: can I buy you lunch or, uh, dinner? ”

You consider, seriously, that this man may be clinically insane. You have no other rational explanation for his showing up at your door on a Thursday afternoon, let alone his proposition. But you allow yourself to imagine it: you and him, sitting across a table with Jean’s ghost between and behind you. Your stomach turns at the thought.

“You murdered my friend,” you say slowly, “right in front of me.”

He nods. A pained look crosses his face, and that expression spurs your anger. It hadn’t occurred to you earlier that you should call the police. This man is a murderer, and he’s walking free.

“You shouldn’t even be here — you should be in a prison somewhere!” You choke out as your throat tightens with impending tears.

“I didn’t have a choice. I didn’t want to kill her!” He says forcefully. “I didn’t want to kill anyone. I — ”

“But you did kill her!” You can’t hold them back anymore, and now, you’re crying in front of the man who killed Jean. Humiliation heats your cheeks.

“You did kill her,” you repeat quietly. You turn your watery gaze away.

“You’re right, I’m sorry.” He says.

In your peripheral, you watch him step closer. When you flinch, he bobs back.

You should step back, shut the door, and call the police. Not that a slab of wood could stop him if he wanted to get to you. You’ve seen his silver arm. You’ve felt the grip of its fingers at the base of your neck. But, maybe you could manage a dial ‘9-1-1’ before —

“Look, I’m not asking for your forgiveness,” he interrupts your line of thought and, against your will, you look at him again, “I know I don’t deserve it, but I do want to offer you answers. Maybe it can…” He waves his hand as he searches for what he thinks are the right words. “Maybe it can give you some closure. And then, you’ll never see me again.”

You consider the furrow of his eyebrows. Over the years, you’ve tried reconstructing his face from its missing half. Now that you have the full picture, it makes perfect sense: the upper edges of the mask aligned with the cut of his cheekbones, the thin bridge really did conform to his nose, and the wideness of his jaw was merely accentuated. But his features are such a striking contrast to the severity of that mask and that metal arm. He looks so much leaner than you remember. He looks like a man, not a machine.

“Stay here,” you say. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

He nods and his brow softens. You shut the door and press your forehead against it.

After a few beats, you rest your hand on the base of your neck and suck in a few deep breaths. It’s a calming technique Dr. Kaplan taught you. But without meaning to, you flex your fingers. Just as your heart was beginning to slow, you’re pulled into the memory of him raising you by the throat. You gasp for air.

That man is behind this door. That man is behind this door.

You race around the couch to snatch your phone off the coffee table. You unlock it with shaking hands and now, your thumb hovers over the number pad.

“Fuck,” you whisper as you press ‘9’.

It’s true. You do want answers. You want to know why he killed her. You want to know about Hydra and his role in it. You want to know why he left you alive.

So you’ll get your answers, then call the cops.

You pull on some real pants and cover up with a sweatshirt. But at the door, you hesitate to step out again. If you’ve imagined that whole encounter, if it was some vivid manifestation of your survivor’s guilt, then you wouldn’t have to go.

You press your ear against the door, and, as if your doubts had broadcasted through the wood, he coughs. You sigh and grab the doorknob. Your hand isn’t sweaty this time.

At the sound of the hinges creaking, his gaze snaps to you. You meet his eyes without meaning to. There’s no recognizable emotion in them. The creases in his forehead and the furrow in his brow are gone. Now, his face gives nothing away.

“There’s a place about two blocks from here,” you say simply.

He nods and looks to you as if for direction. If he were anyone else, you would start heading for the elevator without further ado, but the thought of Jean’s killer trailing behind you makes your stomach flip.

“I’d prefer you walk ahead,” you utter. His eyebrows raise slightly, but he gives no other visible reaction.

“Alright,” he says.

He moves down the hallway, and you follow. Your eyes stay trained on his back. Aside from your occasional direction, it’s a silent walk.

⭑⭑⭑

Sully’s is a dive, but it’s always busy, and this evening is no exception. The people who frequent this place are the kind of people who get loud after a few drinks and don’t give two shits about you unless you’re bleeding out on the floor. That’s perfect. God forbid anyone overhears your questions about murder and secret organizations.

“You want anything?” He asks after you choose a corner booth and tuck in. His casual tone bothers you, but he keeps his distance, at the very least.

“No,” you deadpan.

He nods and starts for the bar. A few people graze him as he passes, and it’s so crowded that you’ve already lost sight of him.

You place your phone face-up on the sticky, varnished wood table. Absentmindedly, you nudge the pedal base with your foot. You try to hone in on any particular voice, but all you hear is a buzz of conversation. It’s a comfort. It means that you’re not alone and he can’t hurt you here.

“I know you didn’t ask for anything, but…” Fuck. Your knee knocks on the bottom of the table. His voice is so sudden at your side.

He places a water glass in front of you, and you stop yourself before you can say “thanks”. He drops into the chair in front of you, a beer bottle tucked between his gloved palms. Gloves. He’s wearing gloves. You hadn’t noticed until now.

There’s an awkward pause. He watches you intently. Your stomach is churning, but you steadily meet his gaze. You have so many questions. Some of the things he’s said don’t make sense. One thing, in particular, though, is nagging at you.

“Back there, you said you didn’t have a choice,” you say dubiously, “what did you mean?”

He takes a drag of beer and sets the bottle down carefully before he speaks. “They brainwashed me.” He replies bluntly. “Hydra, I mean.”

Brainwashing? It’s not entirely outside the realm of possibility. Aliens exist, as do superheroes and Norse gods and Mad Titans. What was once science-fiction is now very real and devastating.

He gives you a few beats to process, then continues. “For seventy years, I operated as The Winter Soldier.”

“Wait. Seventy years?”

“I just turned 106 in March,” he says with a sardonic smile.

“How is that possible?”

“I was on ice.” He sighs. “They only took me out when they needed me.”

“And Hydra… what happened to them?”

His jaw tightens. It’s the most reaction you’ve gotten so far. “They used to have this saying: cut off one head, two more take its place… Maybe they’ll come back, but right now, they’re gone.”

“So they aren’t after me,” you say softly, more to yourself than him.

“If Hydra wanted you out of the way, they wouldn’t’ve sent me.” He grimaces, even as his voice mocks a shrug.

You get it now: you’re not a threat, and you never were.

“But I was a loose end, wasn’t I? Why didn’t you kill me?”

He shakes his head and says, “I don’t know.”

He doesn’t elaborate further. Instead, he finishes off his bottle and shifts his gaze to the table.

After a minute or two, you consider moving on, but something about his expression, both vacant and pensive, implores you to wait. In the interim, you glance from the people knocking shoulders at the bar to the couple in front of you.

“It was that look on your face,” he says, and you find his gaze is fixed on you again. “It was rage. And grief. And that-that grief almost overtook everything else, but I saw it.” He leans towards you, his eyebrows knitting close. “That part of you that… that part of you that wanted me to kill you, too.”

He glances at his hand on the table and releases a shaky breath. “I understood that,” he says. “I know what it’s like.”

Like a clenched fist releasing, the tightness in your chest eases. You understand something else, now, too. This is meant to be an exchange. He wants answers as much as you do, no matter how much pain they carry.

“Do you wanna know what I saw? On your face?” You ask after a few beats. He hesitantly nods. “Nothing. There was nothing,” you say. “You didn’t even look human. It was like you were an animal. And you were looking at me like I was prey.”

You look away. The intensity of his eyes threatens to pull you into that memory. “I’ve never been more terrified in my entire life.”

“I’m so sorry,” you hear him say.

“I’m not the one you should be apologizing to,” you say quietly, chancing a glance up.

His face twists into something like shame. If he were a different person, you might try to comfort him. But he’s not a different person. He’s a stranger wearing the face that’s haunted you for nine years.

“So why now?”

“Well, I was…” He mimics a snap with his right hand. “And after that, I… started going to therapy.”

He pulls a small, brown book from his jacket pocket. “My, uh, shrink told me to make a list of people I’ve wronged,” he says as he flips it open to a page in the middle and places it in front of you. “You’re one of the last.”

You find your name third-to-bottom. The ones above are crossed through. He glances from your face to your fingers as they trace his careful scrawl.

“You don’t let people look at this, do you?” You ask.

He half-smiles and shakes his head.

“So why are you letting me?”

“I, uh,” he flexes his hand. “I don’t know. I just… thought I owed it to you.”

You briefly consider asking about the other names, but he doesn’t owe you those. He owes you answers about the life he can’t return. Just as another question bubbles up your throat, a ringtone sounds. You glance at your phone’s black screen, then back to his furrowed brow. He reaches into his back pocket to fish out a flip phone. A flip phone. You haven’t seen one in years.

“Shit,” he mutters under his breath. He looks up from the screen.

“Sorry, I have to take this,” he says as he squeezes out of the booth. He disappears as quickly as before.

⭑⭑⭑

You finally take a sip of water. The sweat of the glass bleeds onto your fingertips, so you wipe your hand off on your pant leg before touching your phone. 6:15, it says, which means you've been sitting on this hard, plastic seat for over forty minutes. He's been gone for about ten of them.

Before you can seriously consider just leaving, his form comes into view.

"I've gotta go, but..." He says as he pulls the brown book out of his pocket again. When he opens it, he tears a small piece from the page corner, then scribbles something with a pen.

He places the piece of paper next to the perspiration ring on the table. Stealing one last glance at you, he turns and leaves for the third and final time.

On it is a phone number and a name:

Bucky

#tfatws spoilers #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes #the falcon and the winter soldier #the birdman and the winter warrior #brown book

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plus-size-reader · 4 years ago

Text

Reunited

Seperated pt.2

Daryl Dixon x Plus size!reader

Word Count: 1751 words

Warnings: none

Summary: When Glenn and the reader are reunited, both Daryl and Maggie find themselves feeling especially jealous.

Part 1

——————————————————————————————————

You followed Daryl down the path he'd came from, doing your best to keep from stumbling or holding him up too much.

It wasn't lost on you that Daryl was doing you a huge favor by sticking his neck out for you and you didn't want to cause him any more problems than he may have been dealing with already. On that front, you did better than he thought you would, considering the shape that you were in.

"You doing okay?" he wondered, turning back to you slowly. The two of you had been following the main road thus far, making it a pretty smooth path but he just couldn't be too careful. You were a few paces behind him, so he stopped to let you catch up and then checked the tightness of the wrap.

So far, you were doing alright.

"I'm alright, don't worry" you assured, finding it funny that he was checking on you. There was no good reason for him to care so much but he did. It even surprised Daryl that he cared so much but he decided not to think about that.

It was probably just because you were hurt, or all alone. He knew that feeling and didn't want you to have to go through that if you didn't have to.

"So, you wanna tell me where we're going to?" you asked, finally getting up the courage to do so. You didn't get a really good feel for what Daryl communicated like until much later in your walk but now that you got a better idea, you needed to know.

It wasn't everyday that you just followed a complete stranger to a mystery location, and if you could fill in a few of those pieces, you were going to try.

The male in question was silent for a moment, visibly slowing his pace so that you could keep up. You were hurt, and he didn't want you to feel like you were slowing him down or anything silly like that.

He just assumed that you were that type to feel like you were constantly a burden or some shit like that.

"It's a prison. There's a whole group of us held up there right now, it's got walls and all that" he decided, figuring that was the best description he could give you without getting into too much needless detail.

That was just the way it was, pretty simple.

"A prison huh? Sounds homey" you joked, you had no idea what you were going to do when you got there or if the others would want to accept you, but you were just going to have to see. A joke seemed odd, given the circumstances but you couldn't help yourself.

Surprisingly, Daryl laughed.

It was a dry laugh, deep in his throat and not very amused but you took it as a win. That was the closest you'd gotten to any real emotion from him in all this time. For you, it was more than enough and guaranteed that wasn't going to be the last joke you'd attempt.

"It's not as bad as it sounds" he shrugged, in a way that told you it must not have been. Though, even if it was a hole in the ground, it was more than you'd had for the last few weeks. Anything was better than sleeping on a pile in the ground or under the back seats of a car.

You nodded, stopping short when you came across a fallen tree, covering a pile of dried brush. Daryl stopped first, causing you to almost run into him, though you managed to stop just before you could.

It didn't make any sense. Until, you saw the very front end of a tire peeking through the leaves. This must have been how Daryl had gotten out here in the first place, but that also meant that you had to go back the same way.

"You ever road a motorcycle before?" he questioned, pulling it up on its two wheels. You hadn't, and you would have thought that was obvious. However, when you shook your head, Daryl chuckled.

So, your real joke wasn't funny but the fact that you'd never been on a motorcycle was? This guy didn't make any sense.

"You're being serious? I'm not getting on that thing" you huffed, folding your arms across your chest. The action made your cut burn but you ignored it, trying to keep your ground steady. You were scared of it, and to be fair, anyone would have been.

Your mama always told you that motorcycles were dangerous, and you believed her.

"Well princess, I don't see any other options so unless you want to stay here..." Daryl hummed, gesturing off to the bike, which you really didn't want to get on. Though, you didn't want to be left here more, so you agreed.

You let Daryl get on first, and then you tried your best to get on, throwing your leg over like you were trying to straddle a horse. You had never done that either but you figured it was the right approach and when you didn't fall off, it seemed to have worked.

"Now just hold on tight and try not to fall off" Daryl joked, though you were beginning to think that he was being serious. In any case, you did as he said, holding tight to his middle to keep from falling off and before you knew it, there was a huge prison in front of you.

He was telling the truth.

The walls seemed pretty sturdy, and from what you could tell, there weren't any holes that would cause any glaring problems. Still, everything you were thinking about faded away as soon as you saw Glenn standing there behind those walls.

For a second, you thought that you were hallucinating, but there was no way that was true. You were in a little bit of a rough spot but not that rough. You would have known him anywhere and while you never thought you'd see him again, there was no disputing it.

That was Glenn.

"Oh my God. Oh my GOD!" you squealed, doing your best to get off the back of the motorcycle as gingerly as you could, though seeing as it hadn't fully stopped yet, you faltered on your way. You were okay, and safe within the walls, but it didn't stop Daryl from scoffing.

"What are you doing? Stop that" he chastised, looking at you like you were out of your mind, and maybe you were but you couldn't worry about that. All you could think about was Glenn, standing there with mud on his face.

Before you even knew what was going on, you jumped into him, wrapping your arms around him in a pretty aggressive way. It hurt like a bitch, the open wound in your side punishing you for it immediately but you ignored it.

Right now, you didn't care about anything other than him.

"I thought you were dead. I thought you were dead" he muttered, holding you close with his head in your neck. It was the sort of thing that only two lifelong friends would do after so much time, and you didn't even question it.

However, a few feet away, Daryl was putting the motorcycle up and had very obviously changed his demeanor. He was angry seeing you like that with him, a strange feeling bubbling up in his stomach, but he ignored it.

Clearly, there was something going on between you, but he didn't know what and he wasn't alone. Maggie was struggling with the same thing from where she was standing. Right now, her partner was all wrapped up in a complete and total stranger and she didn't like that. No one would have in her place.

"I thought you were dead too" you replied, pressing a kiss to his cheek before backing away completely, fixing where his hair had gotten a bit messed up in the hug. It had gotten quite a bit longer than the last time you'd seen him.

That seemed to be the last straw for Maggie who stepped forward and cleared her throat. That was more than enough for you and Glenn to turn your attention toward her, and the smile she'd plastered onto her beautiful face.

"Who is this?" she asked, her arms folded in front of her chest as she addressed you. It wasn't aggressive or hostile, just distant and given everything that was going on, you couldn't blame her.

By this point, Daryl had come to stand at your side. He had given you your space to catch up but until you got acquainted with everyone here, you were his responsibility. Not to mention the fact that he had found himself quite fond of you in your time together.

He didn't just want to throw you to the wolves, at least not before he made sure that you got that cut taken care of.

"Her name's Y/N, I found her out there" he spoke up, addressing her question before Glenn even got the chance. At which point, you nodded, offering a hand to her in return, "I'm Y/N" you repeated, looking between her and Glenn as if waiting for the same.

However, he was still so caught up in the fact that this was happening, and that you were alive that nothing else mattered. Something as simple as introducing someone he cared about to his girlfriend was a luxury he didn't really think about anymore.

Though, you coming back into his life was the perfect opportunity.

"Oh yeah, this is Maggie. She's my girlfriend" he introduced. It sounded so mundane, so normal but maybe that was because it was. The two of you had made it all this way, separately and still managed to come back together.

It was nothing short of a miracle.

"Glenn and I were friends as kids, we grew up together" you filled in finally, figuring she had the rest of the pieces to put the story together fully.

You were beyond ecstatic to meet her. Immediately, the tense reaction she'd had to you initially melted away and she smiled. All she needed was some context to understand but Daryl wasn't going to be so easy.

Even knowing all that, he still had that feeling in the pit of his stomach and he wasn't sure why. Until he found out though, he wasn't going to be able to relax. That was for sure.

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rheagodlywrites · 3 years ago

Text

He’s Supposed to be DEAD Alive

Not long after Tommy’s last life was taken in the prison. You and Tubbo take different ways to mourn him. Tubbo does his best to move on but you get stuck in the past as you create his grave. One day while visiting, you think your thoughts are running wild as he appears in from of you…Is he real?

TW: Swearing, Character Death, Hallucinations, Panic/Anxiety attacks…etc.. You’ve been warned.

“Y/n! Hurry! You gotta run!” Your friend pulled you by the arm. You were something that villages saw as a monstrosity. An evil. You were a hybrid of a spider. You had spider legs on your back. Black skin with four red eyes on your face. You had black hair that was tipped white. You had a large mouth that you usually kept hidden under some clothes. You hated the dark since when you were awake, you had to force yourself to avoid attacking others hat didn’t deserve it. Your friend. Your only friend that you’d ever have…Lily. She was a kind soul that saw good in you from day one. She yanked you away from the arrows that had been shot at the two of you. People were screaming her name and yelling at you to give her back. You frowned at her but she only smiled. As you run you nearly trip over your own feet. An arrow flew your way and she took it to the stomach. She fell to the ground as the faint sounds of the villagers came close.

“I can’t keep going. But you can! Don’t worry! Keep running south and you’ll find another village. It’s ten clicks away but you’ll make it! i know you will!” You cry as you hold her hand. Tears fell as you watched the life fade out of her eyes. Her eyes…the light leaving her eyes were the most painful thing to watch. You run. You run without stopping not even for a moment,not even stopping when the sounds of angry villagers faded. You held the flower hair clip that was once in her hair as tears blurred your vision. You found the village that was far off. You stopped as you sat near the well inside. A man with blonde hair approached you with a kid with the same hair and a boy with black hair. They brought you too their home and you learned of their names.

“I’m Tommy and this Eryn! Let’s all be awesome friends! Ok?!” They welcomed you with so much kindness and thought..they didn’t care for the abnormalities that you had and you liked it that way. Your first best friends…will be with you forever.

———

-Tommyinnit was killed by Dream-

The words appeared on your chat log so suddenly. You felt yourself pale as you read the same words over and over. People were talking in the chat on your communicator. You tucked it away and run. You run all the way to the prison entrance. It wasn’t real..no..nononono NO! Sam stood remorseful in front of the prison preventing anyone else from entering the prison. Few were there..Tubbo was there with Ranboo. You liked them both. Trusted them even. You push past them and stare Sam in the eye.

“You need to back off with the rest of them. I can’t do my job until you all leave” You hissed and webbed his face out of anger. You can spit webbing out of your mouth but you hate doing it since people say the feeling is gross.

“Like hell I will! You let one of my BEST FRIENDS die! You let him die to the one person that YOU were supposed to keep away from!” You cried for his death. You cried from the shaking feeling inside your heart. You felt your body shake as you cursed Sam out. A habit you adopted from Tommy after listening to years of him cursing. Sam stood there and took it at face value not even flinching. This only infuriated you more.

“He trusted you to keep Dream under control! To keep him in the prison and or when he visited to take him out when he asked! He trusted you! I-I trusted you!”

“Maybe that was your mistake?!”

“HOW WHEN YOU OFFERED TO TAKE THE PLACE,YOU PATHETIC FUCKING EXCUSE FOR A MAN! I’M A CHILD! WHEN AM I ALLOWED TO MAKE MISTAKES?! ALL OF US GET SHIT ON FOR ANYTHING WE DO AND HAVE DONE! WHY CAN’T WE GET A DAMN BREAK!” You hadn’t even realized that you had your axe on his neck barely cutting his neck. Tubbo gently pulled you back. You let him. You turned on him as you walk away.

“I wouldn’t let you watch over my anything if I had the power over it.”

Since that day, you had avoided most people. You had set up his grave on a hill away from anyone that might vandalize it. You stayed away from the Eggpire sine they had been aiming for his demise for a while. You had sat in front of his grave. The realizations set in as you picked up your breathing. You cried as your breathing became more shallow. Your body shook as you coughed through your tears.

“Tommy..I didn’t wanna loose you too.. Why? Why? WHY!” You wailed between your breaths. You slowed your breathing and the faint sound of Tommy’s voice echoed in your ears.

“Heyyy Big Q!” You turned at this. He sounded so close. You looked around. You wanted to believe it was a lie.

“Tommy?” Silence. The wind blew your hair around and made you feel cold from the tears.

“Y/n, you’re a spider?! That so cool! I wanna be a spider!”

“Me gustaaaaa!”

“Come on,Y/n! If we all say it together then it’ll be funny!”

You covered your ears and hugged yourself with your extra limbs. His voice haunted you. You shut your eyes and then when his voice left..you opened them.

Your flow of panic left but you saw a familiar blur run down the hill. You scrambled to your feet and followed. You followed him down the hill but once you got to the bottom with the clearing. There was no one there. You looked around like a wild animal. Looking for Tommy, looking for a reason to believe that he’s alive. But there was nothing like that. He was dead. You collapse on a nearby tree and gripped your shirt. Your breathing started to pick up and tears blurred your vision. You started to kick at the dirt,digging holes in the ground with the heels of your feet until you let out a loud scream. You screamed into the wind for a while till you stopped. Your voice was sore and eyes were dry but you couldn’t bring yourself to move. The voice was back. HIS voice was back along with Lily’s and you didn’t know how to even cope.

Ever since that day, you spent your weeks keeping his grave clean and attempting to move on. You tried to talk with other more or even make yourself look more refreshed but your ears still heard his voice. Your eyes played tricks and say him in the distance or right in front of you. Your dreams..oh god your dreams..

You hauled yourself up the hill. The smell of the forest and nature surrounding the area made you want to go home but you denied the urge. You made it to the top just as the sun was right above in the sky. You stared at Tommy’s grave and just looked.

“Hey Toms. I just wanted to drop off these flowers. They’re white and red like the shirt you loved wearing when I first met you.. remember that? You were so upset when I accidentally tore it with my spider leg. You made me-“

“Repair it with your webs but Phil found out about it and did it himself..” A familiar voice had interrupted your sentence. You turned and saw Tommy. He was right there but you didn’t believe it. He smiled but you only laughed to yourself. You laughed at what you thought was just another hallucination.

“I bet this is another fake. I’ll close my eyes or look again and poof! GONE! Tommy has been dead for two weeks…he’s really gone.” You turned from him but you felt something wrap around you as you curled up into a ball.

“I am real you dickhead.” You poke him and held your breath. He’s really here. He’s alive..

“Tommy, I thought you were..Tommy!” You pulled him into a hug and cried. He held you as you cried on his shoulder. Tommy didn’t know what to do but he let you cry without complaining as he knew it has taken a toll on you.

“I’m here. It’ll probably be ok...”

#writing #fantasy #fiction #fanfic #dsmp #minecraft #angst #dsmp tommy #platonic #dsmp fanfic #character death #hallucinations #revived tommyinnit

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pparkerpoetry · 4 years ago

Text

Hold the Pieces of a Shattered Heart

Summary: “What happens to him?” Tommy asked.

“He dies.” Death said. “He comes into my realm, broken. No one knows he has died, and no one bothers to learn.”

-or-

Tommy was killed by Dream. When Dream tries to resurrect him, he doesn't want to go back- but Death shows him what happens to all of his friends should he refuse.

Ironic, isn't it. Death herself trying to convince Tommy why he needs to live.

_________

Tommy opened his eyes.

The fact that he could open them was a miracle by itself, because last he remembered he was in the prison cell with Dream, on the ground, being hit over and over and over-

Tommy didn’t want to think about it.

He wasn’t there anymore, it was pretty clear since instead of the dark walls that had seemed to close in on him whenever he looked away, there was a comforting landscape of rolling hills and twittering birds. Where was he?

From down the hill he was sitting on, he heard voices, and though some part of him knew who they were, he still hoped it was Tubbo. That Sam had let him out and he’d just taken a nap, that he was real, and there, and alive.

His feet didn’t make any noise on the grass, however real the place looked. It was unsettling, it was, but he still walked towards the voices. His search led him to a quaint little cottage, out of the way and nicely built, the opposite of everything that Tommy had ever made. He liked it, though. Or maybe the laughter from inside seemed better than the silence that he was forced to listen to. When had the birds stopped singing? Had he been imagining it?

He couldn’t be sure of anything. He didn’t even know where he was.

Tommy stepped up to the door and knocked. The laughter stopped abruptly, and from inside a rumbling voice groaned, “I swear if it’s that green bastard again-”

Another voice made itself known, this time so heart-achingly familiar. “Mex doesn’t knock.” The voice was filled with sadness, and it made Tommy sad. That voice wasn’t made to speak in soft tones and sorrowed lilts, it was meant to soar and to sing and to lead.

The door opened.

Wilbur stood there, real Wilbur, not some half-assed ghost of his brother. His eyes were filled with shock, and Tommy knew his heart had dropped from the expression on his face and the way that Wilbur raised a hand to search its way through his curls. “...Tommy? What are you doing here?”

If Tommy tried to speak, no noise left his throat the first time. He tried again, this time over the shock of seeing his brother again. His voice was also flooded with emotion and hurt, something that he’d kept hidden from everyone else for so long so that they wouldn’t treat him any less. “What do you think? The bitch killed me.”

“Dream? Dream killed you?” Wilbur lifted a hand to cup Tommy’s cheek, but the teen flinched away. Hands near his face brought too many bad memories.

“Yeah.”

Wilbur’s eyes were glassy with tears that he’d never let himself shed. “Oh, Tommy. You never deserved this. Not when you’re so young.”

“And you did?” Tommy asked, the pools in his eyes reflecting the pain that he’d buried deep inside of himself. “You deserved to die, all while we were forced to make a world for ourselves with no one to guide us?”

“You had Phil-”

“Phil?” Tommy laughed, but the giggle died in his throat before it could worm its way out. “Phil killed you and dipped. He doesn’t know me. I’m just some teenager that got in the way.”

Wilbur’s eyes furrowed. “That’s not right- I wrote to him,”

“And he never read the letters.” Tommy ground out. “It was just Tubbo and me. And Dream. Where have you been, if you don’t even know that?”

“Ghostbur was supposed to tell me what was going on,” Wilbur said quietly. “He came back a bit ago with the last message, and now, it’s just me.”

“And me!” Called a voice from inside the cottage, slurred with the memory of liquor. “I’m the best part.”

Tommy laughed, a real laugh, not some half-assed exhale like when he couldn’t bear to force one out. And then Wilbur laughed, and it suddenly hit Tommy that he was here, he was with Wilbur- and suddenly he launched himself at his brother and they were both crying, wrapped in the first real hug that Tommy’d had since before his second exile.

“I missed you, Wil.”

Wilbur held Tommy closer. “I missed you too. I just wish we hadn’t met like this. God, Tommy. You’re so young.”

“So are you.” Tommy reminded, turning to look up at Wilbur. “So is everyone on the server.”

“Not Phil.” Came a voice from behind the two. A feminine voice. A new one. “Phil is much older than you can fathom.”

Tommy brought himself away from Wilbur’s arms and looked at the woman who stood a ways away. “And who are you?”

“I’m Death.” She said simply, and Tommy knew it was true.

He wasn’t sure which part of her exuded the confidence of the only being who was at the beginning of creation and would be there at the end of it all, inevitable- was it her dress, long and soft, the folds of it whispering of the victims who’d dared to challenge her? Was it her hair, pulled back in a facade of relaxation, but intricately braided and ready for battle? Was it her scabbard, encrusted with jewels and riches that only one of immense power could have, holding a sword of flames and fire? Or maybe, was it the wings? Was it the dark wings that grew from her back and stretched past what she should be able to hold up, a menacing wingspan that could nurture and protect as well as smite down, that let Tommy know that she was nothing other than Death?

“I’m Death,” she repeated softly, walking towards Tommy, reaching out a hand that he trusted for once, “and Life hasn’t been kind to you, I see.”

“Phil hasn’t helped, either,” Wilbur grumbled, and Tommy’s face twisted in confusion.

The woman sighed. “Don’t speak ill of my Angel. He may have his flaws but that was why he was cast down in the first place. I have claimed him, and you would do well to remember the power I hold over this realm. I may be kind to you for your connection to him, but softness has no place where I am from.”

Tommy knew her words were true, but still, he trusted her.

“Tommy,” She clucked her tongue and met his gaze. “I need to bring you home.”

“What if I don’t want to go back?” He asked, voice breaking. “What if I want to stay here?”

“I can’t let that happen.” She frowned. “What has happened that Life turned on you so harshly?” Her hand touched his forehead, and for a second, her eyes closed. When they opened, no tears filled them, just anger. Not at him, but at all that had broken him.

“I don’t want to go back,” Tommy whispered, tears streaking down his face. “He can’t hurt me here.”

“You were never meant to stay here.” Death’s wings circled him slightly. “This was never permanent. Just a play of power by the man who has delusions of godhood.”

“Then why let him win?” Tommy’s voice grew a little louder. “Why let him control me?”

“Though he isn’t a god, he’s got one on his side. As I have chosen my Angel, Life has chosen his Runner, capable of outrunning even Death. He has forced my hand- I cannot interfere or he will learn of my existence. He has yet to know of the power he could hold, and should he, your existence would be much worse.”

“Please don’t make me go back.” Tommy tried again. “Please, don’t make me go back.”

Death held out her hand for him to take. “Then let me show you what will come to pass should you stay here. Let me show you how they suffer.”

A bright flash of light made Tommy close his eyes, but he opened them once he could tell it had faded. Instead of endless, rolling hills, the landscape of L’manburg was there instead. Jack was there, and Quackity, speaking of a business deal.

“What do you mean, Tommy’s dead? When did this happen?” Quackity asked, voice vulnerable and open.

“Today,” Jack said, looking down. “In the prison. Dream killed him.”

Tommy turned to Death. “This is just now, right? This is normal. Grief, n’ shit. They’ll be fine.”

Death sent him a look, before flicking her hand. They were now in a land Tommy hadn’t seen before, in a house that he’d never had the pleasure of visiting. “They’ll be fine?” She asked, gesturing towards a chair in the corner of the room.

Quackity was there, with Sapnap and Karl. They all looked broken. George was there, a little bit away.

“He’s dead,” Quackity said, letting a few tears fall. “Dream killed him.”

“Say it again,” George demanded.

“Dream killed him, George,” Sapnap yelled. “Don’t you get it? I told you before, and I’ll tell you again- he doesn’t care about us. He’s not the same Dream we knew, and you need to face it! You keep defending him, but at some point, he’ll come after me, too. I threatened him. What’ll you do, then? You’ll go to my funeral and try to convince yourself that Dream still cares? What’ll you do when Dream goes after you? Are you going to die trying to convince yourself that he won’t kill you?”

Karl spoke up. “Let it be, Sap.”

George stared at the crackling fireplace. “Yeah.” He whispered. “Yeah, I’ll die trying to convince him that he’s still in there. I’m not giving up on him. He deserves a second chance.”

“He just murdered a teenager!” Sapnap exploded, barely contained flames spreading across his skin. “He stopped deserving a second chance when he made it clear that he’d want a third. And a fourth. And as many as it would take for us to realize that he’s taking advantage of us,”

George shook his head. “You’re ridiculous.”

“And you aren’t seeing reason!” Sapnap broke, tears sizzling as the flames made way for them.

“Sap,” Quackity said softly. “Let it go.”

George left the house as the three lovers broke into tears over the one that had held the server together. He didn’t return.

“What happens to him?” Tommy asked, watching the blue shirt fade into the distance.

“He dies.” Death said. “He comes into my realm, broken. No one knows he has died, and no one bothers to learn.”

She pulls Tommy along by the arm to another scene.

Tommy saw Fundy, sitting on the docks that had been through so much and seen more. His ears were down, his fur not quite as pristine as he always kept it. The fox was swinging his legs and splashing the water with his feet occasionally, but overall, looked okay.

When Tommy went to speak, Death silenced him. They watched.

Fundy stayed there until night had fallen. Then, he let the tears fall. They flowed in abundance, for he’d lost not only his father, not only his grandfather, but his uncle and friend. He’d lost everyone, truly everyone, for the others were strangers to him now. He was all alone, and as he sobbed and screamed into the cool night air, no one answered. No one lived near enough to the docks to hear him, anymore. They’d all moved, leaving him stranded by himself.

“Tell me he’s okay,” Tommy begged, turning to Death.

“He searches for his mother,” Death said, and Tommy thought he caught a hint of softness in her voice, “He searches for his mother, for she is the only one he hasn’t given up on. He gets in a boat and though he must search all of the vast oceans, he does not give up.”

“And does he find her?” Tommy asked, hoping for good news.

Death almost couldn’t bear to continue. “He doesn’t. He can’t, for though he does not know it, she is gone. He thinks that he gets close, though, until…” She thought about how to phrase it. “I am one of the more forgiving gods.” She said instead, “the god of the ocean didn’t take kindly to Fundy intruding.”

As Tommy is pulled from the view, his mind echoes with thunder and crashing waves, the light showing a silhouette of a small boat, with no one in it. Tommy doesn’t want to think about how Fundy dies alone.

Death beckoned him further, this time to watch Niki.

“I’m glad he’s dead.” She said to herself, sitting on the edge of a giant crater. There are no buildings nearby, so Tommy knew it was the nuke crater. “I failed, and someone else did it. I got the ending I wanted. I am glad that he’s dead.”

Tommy doesn’t like how this was the first time he confirmed Niki was trying to kill him. He hadn’t wanted to believe it, but now, he had no choice.

Niki began to cry. “I just want Wilbur back. I never wanted L’manburg, or Pogtopia, or wars, I just wanted my friendships to survive longer than a betrayal. I wanted to live in peace, and I wanted Puffy to love me.”

The hole echoed with her cries, not mourning for the death of Tommy, but for the loss of Wilbur that still controlled her heart. Tommy understood her hurt, but he still hoped that Niki would have regretted his death at least a little.

Death altered the vision again, but it was still Niki. She appeared to be fine, but Tommy knew that it couldn’t be true. He used to think of Niki as his older sister, surely she missed him, as time went on.

“Tommy was the source of all our problems,” Niki explained calmly. To who, he wasn’t sure. “He had it coming. I miss him a little, but it was for the best.”

And damn, if that didn’t hurt.

Niki had been talking to Jack, who spoke next. “But don’t you see? Revenge wouldn’t have helped us. We’d have been hunted down by everyone else anyway, but revenge wasn’t the answer.”

“Not for us,” Niki shrugged, “But for Dream, it was.”

Jack was silent for a while. “You’ve changed, Niki.”

“And is that a bad thing? I spare myself the hurt of relationships this way.”

“It’s not a good thing,” Jack mutters. “I don’t even know you anymore.”

“Did you ever?” Niki asked, walking away.

Death looked like she was mourning something.

“What?” Tommy asked bitterly. “What’s so sad about Niki’s ending?”

“She lives in isolation,” Death said, “And dies that way. There was no one to warn her of the red vines, and there was no one to mourn her passing.”

Tommy couldn’t help but feel a deep pang in his chest when he thought about Niki dying.

Death waved her hands again, and this time, he saw Ranboo.

He was walking slowly, posture curved more than usual.

“He’s got worse posture than I do,” Tommy smiled, pointing.

Death did not laugh, instead just staring. Tommy turned, too.

He watched as Ranboo planted flowers on his stupid dirt house, crying. The hybrid made no movement in acknowledgement of the burns that the tears caused, sniffling as the soil got caked under his claws. His warbles and sobs grew louder, but no one was there to hear them. No one but the two ghosts, invisible to his eyes.

They watched as Ranboo stood up and walked away.

“Just a bit of acceptance,” Tommy tried lamely.

Death sighs, and suddenly he sees Ranboo in the arctic. It’s snowing, but the hybrid is standing in the open, whimpering each time a snowflake melts on his skin. There is a chest in front of him, open, and when Tommy moves, he sees a note attached to it with a single smile. In the chest is one piece of TNT.

“Oh, god-” Ranboo cried. “I caused that. I- I made the lockdown happen-” Ranboo stands up and stumbles back, in shock. Tommy could do nothing but watch as he grew taller and his eyes changed to purple. He’d entered the enderwalk, and Tommy could do nothing.

“What happens to him?” Tommy asked softly, and Death smiles with a hint of sadness.

“He loses himself,” She says, “to the side that he hated.”

Tommy had the feeling that the ending wasn’t finished. “Is there more?”

“He always was one of Life’s most selfless creations,” Death pondered. “He stops himself from harming others, forever.”

Tommy was going to ask how, but his mind flashed with the image of Ranboo, alone in his house, bleeding out on the floor with a blade in his hand. Tommy has the sick feeling that he knows how he died.

Death sends him a knowing look before the scene changes again.

This time, Tommy saw Tubbo.

“Tommy isn’t dead,” Tubbo said as if it’s a fact. “There’s no way that Sam would let that happen- no, there’s no way. Tommy isn’t dead. This is some sick prank.” But, there was no one there to listen. Only the snow as it fell, cutting off the boy from the rest of the world.

“Tubbo’ll be fine,” Tommy said weakly. “He’s always been the stronger of us.”

“But was that simply because you were there to make him feel strong?” Death asked, pointing to the house that Tubbo had been in.

It was older now, much older. Cobwebs grew in the corners as the roof fell into shambles and dust settled. They moved inside and still, Tubbo was there.

“Has he moved?” Tommy asked, horrified.

“Sometimes.” Death said quietly, watching Tubbo as he sat, curled up against the cold. “If someone makes him.”

“And what happens to Tubbo?”

Death looked at Tommy, and he saw his reflection in her eyes. “Well, what would happen if you lost Tubbo?” When Tommy made no move to answer, she did, instead. “He sits, waiting for me or you. When he hears of the death of his husband, he has nothing left to live for, and does not try to keep me at bay.”

Tommy’s soul ached.

Death kept speaking. “He enters my realm, shattered, and it’s too late for you to put together the pieces.”

“Stop showing me these,” Tommy said, tears welling up.

“You need to learn what happens.” She said firmly, and suddenly all Tommy sees is flashes, flashes of Karl Jacobs, the protector of time, though he does not know it.

Karl tries, hundreds of times, to prevent Tommy’s death. It still happens, regardless, no matter what he does, in worse and worse ways. Karl dies in some of them, but it never sticks. Karl tries so hard to fix it, at the expense of himself, and Tommy swears that once, their eyes meet.

Nothing good lasts forever.

Eventually, Karl gave up and succumbed to the fact that there was nothing he could do.

“What happens to him?” Tommy asked, broken.

Death spares Karl a pitying glance. “Without someone to monitor the server, it falls apart. This might be the largest tragedy of all of them- without the warrior of time, the vines fill the server, and everyone dies.”

“Everyone?” Tommy asked, voice quiet.

Death looked him in the eye. There is no escaping that look. “Everyone. They all enter my realm, including Life’s Runner, and the story happens over again. The same show, a different stage. And this time, no one can escape him. Not even my Angel.” She put an arm around Tommy, but he shrugged it off.

“I don’t want to see any more,” Tommy said firmly, but he had no choice in the matter.

He saw Puffy. Puffy was angry, more than he had ever seen before. She’s staring down Dream, and Tommy can sense her fury.

“You killed him, Dream!” She yelled. “How could you?”

“He called me a liar.” Dream shrugged. “He’ll be back.”

Puffy glared at him. “You don’t get it, do you? You are a liar. Every time you’d come home from school and come up to me, all excited, and claim that you loved me, you were lying. Every time you promised that you’d remember all that I’d raised you to hold dear, you were lying. Every time that I looked my little duckling in the eye as you told me that you wouldn’t forget me, you were lying.”

“I do love you, though.”

“No,” Puffy snarled. “You loved me. The only thing you love now is power and chaos- and I know that I didn’t teach you that. I never taught you how to be selfish or how to kill just for the fun of it- I never taught you any of the things that landed you in this cell.”

Dream looked up at her. “You did your best. It’s not your fault that your best wasn’t enough.”

Tommy tried to not let the voice get under his skin. “Just get it over with. What happens to Puffy?”

Death looked almost regretful. “I sympathize with this one. Her ending is the one of a mother, but there is no glory in it, and there is no point. She tried her hardest before the end, but her love was a weakness. She was one of the only adults who had recognized the proper severity of your passing, and though she was rewarded accordingly after her’s...”

Tommy could only watch as the red vines crept as the time passed. Death beckoned Tommy closer to a different scene, and Tommy could see two people. Purpled was one of them, and the other was Puffy.

The vines had grown until there was almost no space.

Puffy shielded Purpled from them. “Run, Purp. You’ll have time to escape if I stay behind.”

“But then you’re going to-”

Puffy interrupted. “It doesn’t matter. Go, or neither of us will make it out alive.”

Death stopped the scene. “It gets rather ugly. I don’t think you should see it.”

Tommy objected. “But what happens?”

“You know.” Death sighed. “The vines encompass the server. Everyone dies. It doesn’t matter that she bought the boy a few more days, the ending is inevitable.”

Tommy hurt all over, but Death still led. “I don’t want to see any more, please,” Tommy begged, but Death has never been the certain type of kind that he calls for. Death does what is necessary, and right now, the visions were.

The next one was Eret, all alone in his castle, as the walls crumbled around them. They sat on their throne, with no one to follow them and no one to care. Tommy knew what Eret was thinking of- how they’d failed everyone and how Tommy had been so young, and maybe, if they hadn’t betrayed L’manburg in the beginning, they’d still all be a family.

Defeated, Tommy asked what Eret’s end was like.

“They died to a creeper that found its way into the castle while they were asleep.” Death said. “No one expected it, but then again, no one expected your’s, either. They are mourned, but not as much as they should have been.”

Death paused, and Tommy swore he saw a tear in her eye before she wiped it away.

The next scene plays, and Tommy sees Phil.

Phil and Techno were sitting at a table, quiet. There’s a paper lying on the table, a letter about Tommy’s passing, but they don’t speak about it. They just sit.

Death spoke softly. “My poor angel, with his clipped wings. His ending is bittersweet, Tommy. He’s lost his wings, his title, his status, but he gets to be reunited with his son. With me.” Death stopped, reconsidered, and fell silent.

“Are we going to watch it? This isn’t really-”

Death turned sharply. “We won’t be watching his. The warrior’s, however? You may want to see.”

Techno stood on a stage, cornered. Vines were creeping and mobs were everywhere. The world was lonely, and he was alone. They shared that. Technoblade, Tommy realized, was broken.

No longer was the fiery fighter with a catchphrase, all that remained was a shell.

Death spoke up. “Technoblade lingers when all others have passed. He never dies, at least, not at first.”

“What do you mean?” Tommy asked, but he was hesitant to.

“There is a reason that the enderman and Technoblade are so similar, I suppose.” Death mused, and she ushered Tommy along.

“How many are left?” He asked, and Death nodded.

“Just one. The worst of all.”

Tommy stared in horror as he watched Dream stand over him- his corpse- and laugh. He stared as the lava parted to show Sam and Puffy, armed and angry, only to stop in shock at what they had been too late to prevent.

“What did you do?” Puffy demanded, but Sam had already crouched down by the body.

His body.

Sam gathered his body in his arms. The blood-stained the green of his fur, but Sam didn’t care. He felt numb, and he looked it.

“I’ll come back for you, Dream.” He said coldly, as he carried the body of his son out of the cell that he’d begged to be let out of not even twenty minutes before.

“It’s fine,” Dream laughed. “I’ll bring him back and all will be fine and dandy. You worry too much, Sam.”

Tommy looked at Death. “I think I know what happens. Don’t make me watch.”

But Death did not care.

So, Tommy stood as Sam waited for the resurrection to work, waited by his grave, waited by the door of the prison. He blamed himself, he lost himself to grief and to shame, and he fell deeper and deeper into a hole that he’d never escape.

Tommy was forced to watch as Sam Nook tore down the entire Big Innit Hotel and stood, waiting for him, until his battery ran out and he died on the side of the Prime Path, a memory of laughter and learning. He watched as Sam couldn’t handle it anymore and let go, exploding landscapes and builds that he’d once cherished, leaving a lingering smell of gunpowder wherever he went. Someone he’d considered a father figure lost himself as Tommy could do nothing but bear witness, until finally, he turned to Death.

“Just tell me how it ends. It’ll be easier than being forced to watch this.”

And, as Death looked at the child that she was so familiar with, she took pity. “Sam never forgave himself. He waited for you, but once it was clear you wouldn’t return, he turned away. He resorted to destruction, and eventually, it destroyed him. Your cries to be let out of the cell never left him. They played on repeat until it drove him mad, and he had to be dealt with.”

“Dealt with?”

“He threatened the safety of the server to such a degree that outside help was brought in.”

Tommy turned away, but not before he saw a flash of pink hair and the glinting of a sword.

Death stood before him. “Well?”

“Well, what?”

“Are you going to go back, now that you know what happens should you not?”

Tommy sighed. “I haven’t got much of a choice, do I?”

Death offered him a smile as she brought them back to the landscape of rolling hills. Wilbur stood, waiting, but squinted into the distance.

When Tommy turned, he saw another being, hovering over the ground. It was wearing flowing robes of light blue, and had no head. Instead, a globe of white floated above where a neck should have been, and on it was written ‘XD’.

“Who are you?” Tommy shouted at it, as it got closer.

When the being spoke, it sounded like Dream. “I am Life. I made you and everything around you, so you would do well to show some respect. I have come to take you back.”

Death stepped forward. “You may take him, but know that he no longer bears your seal. He is one of mine, now, since you have turned from him. He is under my protection.”

Life scoffed. “As if that matters. His story is written, and he will live it.”

“His story is a script,” Death shrugged, “and scripts can be improvised. I will be watching from the shadows, should your Runner step out of bounds.”

“Then keep your Angel in line,” Life snarled. “I had to keep him from the portal.”

“I saw,” Death smiled calmly. “But that’s what happens when you mess with their coding. Memories still linger.”

Tommy sighed loudly. “Just take me back already. I’m getting bored.”

Life turned to look at Tommy, dead in the eyes, and suddenly, Wilbur’s singing that had been in the background was fading, as were the fields around him. He closed his eyes as a bright light started shining, and then, he opened them.

People surrounded him, and he made it his first priority to fall into Sam’s arms, partially to assure himself that this was real, and partially to assure Sam that he was okay. Everyone got some form of affection, except for Dream. Except for those that hadn’t bothered to show. He’d make amends with the others later, once Dream was back in prison to stay until the ends of time.

He was home, and that was what mattered.

He was home.

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darthkruge · 4 years ago

Text

Bellamy Blake Imagine ~ Reunited

Summary: (request) You were dating Bellamy up in the Ark and haven’t seen each other since you got locked up. Now that you’re back on the ground, you finally reunite.

Words: 1820

Warnings: fluff, a bit of angst, some language

a/n: I absolutely loved writing this. Thank you so much for requesting! I hope this is something like what you had in mind <3

~ Italics symbolize flashbacks ~

You sigh as you wake up in your cell. Another fucking day of this torture. Looking at yourself in the mirror, you see the tear-stains on your cheeks and your matted hair. Ever since you got locked up all those months ago, you haven’t been sleeping. It was so fucking stupid. All you wanted was some extra medicine for your mother. She’d been sick for a while and the rations were spread too thin and she works so hard to help you, you thought you’d get away with it. But you tripped the alarm on your way out of med bay and the guards got to you before you even had a chance to say goodbye to her. Or him. Him.

Bellamy arrived at your door as you sat in the corner, reading one of the mythology stories he lent you. You immediately jumped up and ran into his arms. He chuckled, catching you against him as you wound your arms around each other.

“How was your shift?” You ask, knowing how hard he works as a guard.

“It was alright. I’m tired, though. They’ve been riding my ass lately, something about increasing security protocols. I don’t know.” He sighs, frustrated. You frown. You hate the pressure they put on him. You know he’s reliable and takes his job seriously, but that doesn’t mean they need to put all the responsibility on him.

He sees you upset and his gaze softens. He sighs gently. “I missed you, beautiful.”

Ever since you were locked away, you hoped one day he would show up at your cell. He hadn’t, but not for a lack of trying. You knew that he tried, every day to get to you, just to see you again and make sure you were okay. But the Ark had him on watch, afraid he would do something stupid like try and break you out. So they monitored him constantly. You were glad he at least had the sense to listen. The last thing you could bear is something happening to Bellamy.

“Holy shit, Y/N”

You gently bunched your fingers in the dress you were wearing. It was the only one you had and you weren’t used to wearing it. Nice clothing was such a luxury, you were amazed you had saved enough to even buy this semi-clean, hole-ridden one.

You looked down at yourself and fidgeted with your hands anxiously. “That bad?” You ask, cheeks heating up

“Oh, fuck, no! Babe, you look incredible. I mean, you always look incredible. But tonight you look really, really incredible.” Bellany was rambling. He hated that you didn’t see yourself the way he saw you and spent everyday helping you with your confidence.

You finally look up at him and smile, starting to believe his words. “Thank you, Bell” You whisper softly as he comes up next to you, gently grabbing your hands in his and pressing a gentle kiss to them.

The hoard of guards took you out of your thoughts. Okay, what the fuck is going on? You only saw one guard a day and he brought you food twice, that was it. There were never five guards at once, barreling toward each cell. They break through your door, running toward you and harshly grabbing your arms. You frantically look at them, hoping Bellamy is one of them, but quickly realize he isn’t.

“What the fuck? What are you doing? Where are you taking me?!” You yell frantically, flailing and kicking as they drag you out of your cell. What if they’re going to float me? They might be overpopulated and need to get rid of the juveniles in the SkyBox. It wouldn’t be too far of a reach. Oh shit, what if something happened to my mom? Is that why they’re taking me out??

Eventually they bring you to a strange-looking ladder, leading up to who knows where. They harshly push you up, as more and more prisoners are filing in behind you. Getting lost in the crowd, you have no choice but to climb up and find yourself on a ship. You are pushed toward an empty seat and sit down, instinctively strapping yourself in. You try and calm your breathing, having no idea what’s about to happen to you. Looking around, you recognize some of your old classmates and others who were in the Sky Box with you. It gives you a small piece of comfort that they all seem as confused as you are.

You’re jolted from your seat as the ship takes off and realize you’re falling. You hear whispers and realize that holy shit, they’re sending you to the ground.

You hit the ground less-than-graciously and look down at the bracelet those guards must have strapped on you when they pulled you from your cell. Still confused, you move to stand up, your legs still shaky and breathing uneven from the complete stress of the day. You think about your mother and Bellamy, the two most important people in your life who you will probably never see again. You feel the tears rising up and fight to keep them at bay. This is now about survival and you won’t make it if you spend every day living in the past.

You almost pass out when you hear that voice. “If the air’s toxic we’re all dead anyway,” Someone says. And that voice could only belong to him. It could only ever be Bellamy’s. But how the hell is this even possible? He’s not here, he wasn’t in the skybox. Fuck your brain for playing tricks on you. You know you’ve been thinking about him constantly, but a hallucination is just plain cruel.

The doors open and everyone runs outside. They yell and scream, breathing in the air as they discover they survived. You walk out, hoping the air will clear your head, but you’re still having trouble. Because it can’t be him. Right?

Regardless, you need to see for yourself. You hastily push through the crowd and your knees almost give out when you see him. Your hand goes up to your mouth, eyes filling with tears as the raw emotion of seeing the love of your life for the first time in months hits you. He catches your eye and his face pales. He blinks, unsure if you’re real.

You run to him faster than you’ve ever moved before. You don’t care if you’re pushing someone over. You don’t care if you take up all the oxygen in the world. You don’t care if you die in two minutes, so long as you can touch him one more time. You don’t care about anything else but him, him, him.

You collide with his chest and jump up, legs wrapping around his strong frame. You bury your face in his neck, hot tears sliding down your face. His hands are grabbing your arms, your back, your hair as he feels you and realizes you’re really here. You pull back and so does he, breathless smiles and tears running down both your faces. His arms are now under your thighs, supporting you.

“I thought I would never see you again” You whisper, crying harder.

“Princess, you could never get rid of me that easy” He whispers back, pulling you closer than you previously thought was humanly possible.

He gently sets you down and you collapse into his chest, your head spinning.

“Fuck, I missed you” You say.

“I missed you too. God, I missed you. I tried to get to you, I promise I tried. I’m so sorry. They took you away and I didn’t know and I tried. Every day, every night, every second I wasn’t with Octavia or my mother I was looking for you. Even when I was with them, you were always with me. I- I should have been faster, I should have protected you. Y/N, please, I’m so sorry.”

You shake your head quickly, “Bell, don’t blame yourself. Please, don’t do that to yourself. It was my choice to take that medicine, not yours. And I know you tried. Never for a second did I doubt you. And you were with me too. I couldn’t have made it through without keeping the hope alive that I would see you again. But then they took me and I thought I was going to die and I wasn’t going to say goodbye without telling you I loved you one more time.” Your voice breaks, the emotion overtaking you.

Bellamy’s heart shatters. He’s always hated seeing you cry, seeing the pain you’re going through. All he ever wanted to do was make it better. “Hey, hey, hey. Baby, it’s okay now. I’m here and you’re here and we’re okay. Y/N we're on Earth and we’re alive. That’s pretty fucking incredible”

“Leave it to us, huh?” You say, laughing gently.

He smiles and kisses you, deep and strong. Once again, the world fades and it’s just the two of you. You breathe into each other and pour everything into the kiss. All the feelings of doubt, pain, hurt, love, hope, happiness, and relief of the last months are desperately conveyed into this one, single embrace.

You pull away and look at him, worried.

He looks at you quizzically. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, God, nothing. I have everything I could possibly want. But it’s just hitting me. Bell, what are we going to do? We’re just a bunch of kids, criminals, on Earth. There’s no society, no rules, no food, no shelter, no water. How are we going to survive?” You say, brain scrambling at about a million thoughts a second.

He places his hands on your shoulders, comforting, but firm. Whenever you started to fall into an overthinking spiral, Bellamy grounded you.

“Hey, hey. Breathe with me. It will be okay. We’ll figure it out, it’s what we’ve always done. Y/N, you’re brilliant. I’m sure you’ll come up with wonderful ideas to help us. You always do. And we have survival instincts. It may not look like it now, but I believe in this group. We’re going to need each other to survive and I think they’ll realize that.”

You look at him, feeling slightly better. He always knows what to say to put your mind at ease. You smile, realizing that since you found each other you haven’t kept your hands off each other. Literally. Ever since you ran to him that one time, you’ve been touching. You look at his hands which have now traveled to your arms as he gently caresses them. You softly press your hands to his face, cupping his cheeks as you look at him.

“You are going to be a brilliant leader”

“And I will have the most amazing person in the world right next to me.”

“Obviously. I’m not letting you get all the glory, Blake.”

“I would expect nothing less, L/N.”

@sgarrett49

#bellamy blake #bellamy blake x reader #bellamy blake imagines #bellamy blake fluff #bellamy blake fanfic #bellamy blake fanfiction #bellamy blake angst #the 100 #the 100 imagines #the 100 x reader

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rotzaprachim · 4 years ago

Note

May I humbly submit for the prompt: That was the first time Joe drew Nicky’s face, but the second time was much more interesting.

there are fics i am obsessive about historical accuracy on and then there is the 20k anachronistic comedy universe and i think it’s pretty obvious which one this falls into. hope you enjoy <3

That was the first time Joe drew Nicky’s face- fast-fading evening light and the first flickers of a campfire, and the shadows against the lines of his nose and cheekbones stretching and lengthing even in the fast movement of Yusuf’s charcoal against the back of a map, the sudden twitching in his fingers, feeling that he had to do this, here, but this man on paper, know his face by the lines of it the same way he had known all that were dear to him. Something stabbing in his heart that he both did and did not know the name of, new and hard edged, but washed in an easy and growing affection- that he could admit to. That was the first time he drew Nicolo’s fact, and Nicolo looked at the sketch for a long, long time before he rolled it and put it in the saddle bag.

“So that is how I look,” he said simply. “In your eyes.” A conditional. Yusuf didn’t question him further.

THe secone time was far more interesting.

Wanted. FILTHY FRANK- VENETIAN, Yusuf scribbles, purposefully making a few spelling errors for authenticity sake. A LARGE NUMBER OF DIRHAMS FOR THE MAN, DEAD OR ALIVE.

Nicolo is critical of the work.

“I think I should look more evil. What is the crime i am to be convicted of?”

“Cabbage theft.”

“And the constabulary will bring me in for that?”

“It was a lot of cabbages.”

Yusuf gives the drawing some x-d out eyes and a more murderous expression. It’s hard making Nicolo look like this. Nicolo will never look like this, but, well- the portrait artists doing WANTED signs usually don’t have too much formal education.

“I like this.”

Yusuf puts on the stolen city watch uniform and tacks it in the heard of the souq the next morning with all the other WANTED posters, where, the next morning, said FILTHY FRANK - VENETIAN will wander into the heart of city, and find himself arrested.

“You’re sure about this? About how to do it?”

Nicolo nods.

“Get arrested, break out, kill mininum of guards- preferably, none at all. Second floor is women’s holdings, and that’s where there’s a woman who’s been accused by her husband of a crime she didn’t commit. Break her out and take her back to her sister’s house.”

“Good.” Yusuf nodds. This is simple. This is fine. This is what they DO, or are good at doing, at least, or, more like, TRYING to be good at doing. Helping people out. Being swords for justice. Doing better. They’ve got one particularly unusual talent apiece for not dying, and they better be good at it. They haven’t even died the last couple projects. He’s kind of forgotten what it felt like, and worse- what if felt like to watch Nico die, which isn’t something he should worry about, really, because he kind of has a grudging respect for the bastard, and wants him to be happy, or at least not dead, even though he still hates him a lot, and that feeling sure is mutual. “I’ll be waiting outside the prison with the horses.”

These are some talents that the scrabbling street kid will always be better at than the merchant’s son: climbing walls, breaking out of places, and looking over his shoulder. Just like there are the things that Yusuf is consistently better at, like dealing with people, bartering, dealing with people, arguing out of scrapes, dealing with people, fine calligraphy in three traditions, and also, dealing with poeple. It’s good. They’re very smart and are working out a way to Deal With Each other by a means effective for the good of all.

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” Yusuf suddenly blurts out. “What if the capture you for real and you can’t get out alive and something happens to you?”

“Mhmm.” Nico says. He’s focused on toasting some bread over the fire, very pointedly not looking at him. “We’ve done this before. Baghdad. Basra.”

“You got stabbed in Basra, and the Lepeord disaster in Baghdad-”

“Also we’ve got better at this since The Leapord Disaster. Dealt with the corrupt cistern owner and neither of us even died once.” Nico passes him some bread and white cheese and olives, the bread, of course, perfectly toasted, which is annoying, because he still toasts the bread perfectly even when they’re fighting, which is even more irritating somehow. “If I die, I’ll come back for you. I promise I won’t leave you alone.”

Something stabs inside Yusuf’s heart. Oh, there’s a name for it, but he won’t be thinking about it now.

“Just-” he lets it hang in the heir. “I can’t stop you from being a martyr.” I can’t, because I’d so the same in your situation. I would and I have and I will, and do it all in good faith, because that’s the life we’ve been given. But it doesn’t stop it from hurting, every fucking time.

Nico looks at him suddenly. All deep eyes. “No. You can’t. And I can’t stop you from walking in a court of snakes and backstabber and poisoners because you think you might be able to do some good somewhere, and we’ve had enough deaths to know that we’ll come back again. But God is gracious. It is not yet your time or mind.” He reaches out to unbuckle the saddle bags and pull out an extra blanket. “It’s going to be cold tonight and your shivering teeth are very distracting to my sleep.”

There’s only a few feet of space between them that night. Nico sleeps with a knife under his head, which started out as some kind of threat but now feels more ritualistic as he noticably twirls it between his fingers in the night, letting the the firelight glint off. Now there’s some showmanship, a joke. A promise, against what may lie in the night.

“Goodnight, my hated enemy. I will not let anyone kill you before I get the chance.”

“If that’s your idea of a joke, your humour is more awful than your swordsmanship. My most abhorred foe, i will be angry if you do not survive the night so as to destroy swordsmanship in the morning.

The night is large and the silence is loud.

“Yusuf,” Nico says suddenly. “I will always come back to you. And what’s the worst they can do to me? Kill me?”

#the old guard #khaysanova #yusuf al-kaysani #nicolo di genova #yusuf x nicolo #my writings #prompt fills #i hope everyone enjoys!

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mallowstep · 3 years ago

Note

(I came up with this au while in debate class so I'm calling it the Debate AU if you don't mind)

Tigerstar absolutely misread everything about Riverclan and fucked up so bad by keeping Stonefur, Mistyfoot Featherpaw, and Stormpaw alive and well and healthy but basically doing everything to Leopardstar that he does to Mistyfoot and Feathertail and Leopardstar in the Misty and Leopard AUs that Stone pulls a Scourge in front of all the clans and everyone looks at Stonefur in terror but Stonefur only has eyes for Leopardstar, who is leaning heavily on Mistyfoot. (Like Leopard is beat down, she's loosing hair, and she has deeply infected scratches on her shoulders.Stone and Misty fucking Hate Tigerstar for what he's done to this cat they've known all their lives.) Stonefur kicks Shadowclan the fuck out of Riverclan territory, Mistyfoot doesn't let Mudfur near Leopardstar (neither does Featherpaw, for that matter. She wasn't abused and she's healthy, but she was traumatized in-Tigerstar had her watch Mudfur abuse Leopardstar and Tigerstar himself told Featherpaw Greystripe thought the same things about her.) Featherpaw won't let any warriors in Leopardstar's den unless she's in there with Leopardstar ---so Featherpaw can protect Leopardstar. The silver furred apprentice curls around her leader, "I'm right here, Leopardstar. Stonefur and Mistyfoot are talking to the other clans and then they'll be back. Stonefur said he'd bring back your favorite." Featherpaw added, purring as she groomed Leopardstar's head. "Stormpaw said he went and got the best trinket for your new den though, and he thinks it's going to be your choice over uncle Stonefur's."

damn anon. thank you. hold on i'm going to engage.

also fair like. i'm. i'm out of the haze and not good at keeping track of au tags so. the only ones i'm really tagging for are the ones i'm like. still thinking about. stone au atm. just didn't want like. u to be. think it was a thing. i'm just tired 100% of the time. anyway.

cw: sexual assault, physical abuse, a few more detailed cws immediately under the cut

cws: parent being involved in sexual assault of child, child sexual abuse (via exposure)

cool. sometimes it's like. i dunno. anyway. sorry i said i'm tired but also very into this.

anyway /nm but also reminder to everyone that i have adhd and would prefer if you included paragraph breaks. obviously i just copy it into a document and add my own but. i appreciate when you save me the step. like i get it y'all've seen me ramble at Length in one paragraph before i just. appreciate it.

okay back on topic.

i'm going to sidestep riverclan related concerns for the sake of "angst good," lmao. riverclan related concerns being if i wasn't tired i could easily come up with a justification i'm just tired and lazy.

but like yeah like. uh. dammit i'm already opening up tpb books left and right. let me just.

"But common sense says there’ll be a battle, Firestar. I don’t need an omen from StarClan to tell me that."

oh my god can cinderpelt like. go and talk to all of the modern medicine cats so that they stop flipping out because starclan isn't answering their texts or whatever.

Remembering the wounded and devastated cats in the WindClan camp the day before, he had expected only a small group to come to Fourtrees. Instead practically every warrior must have been there.

i mean windclan has like five warriors but-

Firestar waved his tail to signal to the two united Clans—LionClan, he thought with a rush of pride. This was his destiny.

this is mostly for jace (assuming u see this) bc it's the whole "importance of lionclan existing" thing i was referring to. didn't bother to pull quotes on my dotc rant, but here u go.

so. point of canon divergence* is:

“Greetings, Tigerstar,” he meowed coolly. “You came, then. Not still looking for those prisoners you lost from RiverClan territory?” Tigerstar let out a snarl. “You’ll regret that day’s work, Firestar.” “Try and make me,” Firestar retorted.

* from firestar's pov

bc obviously that didn't happen.

no, what happens is firestar sees -- blackfoot and darkstripe and.

leopardstar.

firestar harbours no affection for riverclan's leader. but. even from a distance, he can see her ribs. he'd be surprised she was standing on her own, if he wasn't processing everything else going on.

he doesn't see this part.

Mistyfoot's tail flicks to Stonefur's shoulder, and he nods. They've only exchanged a few words, only had a brief moment, but they're ready.

Stonefur glances back. Featherpaw and Stormpaw are out of the way. He hopes, if this goes wrong, they have the sense to run. If they had the chance, he would have told them to skirt the edge of TigerClan and try to make it as deep into ThunderClan's territory as they could.

He hopes they have the sense to figure that out for themselves.

Firestar is exposing Tigerstar's plans. RiverClan doesn't react. There's not much they'd be surprised by, Stonefur muses. If Firestar told them Tigerstar killed his own kit, he doesn't think he'd be shocked.

Mistyfoot slips towards the front of the crowd. Leopardstar doesn't know, of course. Stonefur has barely had the chance to say two words to her in the past moon. He slinks around to the space between the Clans.

Firestar finishes his speech. No one says anything. Firestar looks takenaback. He glances towards Leopardstar; Stonefur does too. Mistyfoot is watching him, but she's looking at the ground.

A part of Stonefur wants to say, "That's not all." Because, as he starts to run, preparing to leap at Tigerstar, he wants them to know why. He wants them to know what Tigerstar has done. He wants them to revel in Tigerstar's death.

But he doesn't.

Tigerstar sees him, of course. Stonefur isn't trying to be subtle.

"You," Tigerstar growls.

Say it, Stonefur thinks. Tell them what you've done.

But Tigerstar doesn't.

The actual fight is a blur. He doesn't think he is himself again, until Tigerstar's corpse twitches and stills, and he looks towards Leopardstar. Mistyfoot has inserted herself between Leopardstar and Blackfoot, and Stonefur nods minutely.

It's over now.

the clans, of course, are...shocked. riverclan has no complaints, and while...everyone (more or less) is happy tigerstar is dead, but...for thunderclan and windclan, stonefur just murdered him without direct provocation. and the fact that he killed him nine times? direct violation of a warrior doesn't need to kill.

like. if they Knew, they would think stonefur just. but they don't know.

and riverclan doesn't want to explain and shadowclan doesn't want to explain and no i'm not at this moment figuring out what happens wrt bloodclan and so forth. i just wanted to set that scene.

yeah. no idea what happens next in a lot of places here. but.

everyone goes home.

("Your territory," Stonefur growls.

"Obviously," Blackfoot says.)

mistyfoot takes leopardstar to her den. stonefur tells stormpaw to run to thunderclan and ask for their medicine cat. tells him to say it's urgent and he can't explain here. tells him that if they want to send her with a warrior or two, don't argue. just get her here.

featherpaw stations herself outside leopardstar's den.

stonefur feels like he should say something. he's still covered in tigerstar's blood.

"we're taking this down," he says, "now."

they dismantle the bonehill.

once the process has been started, stonefur lets the rest of the warriors finish, and grooms himself and washes in the river until he's satisfied every trace of blood has been taken care of.

he's about to see her when stormpaw arrives with cinderpelt and...hm. sandstorm.

(cinderpelt was there. she saw leopardstar. she can start to put pieces together.)

stonefur greets them, and featherpaw goes to tell mistyfoot and leopardstar, and the adrenaline is fading, his limbs starting to tremble. when's the last time he got any real sleep?

"Stormpaw said you needed a medicine cat," Cinderpelt says.

"We do."

"Did something happen to Mudfur?"

"He can't do this." Stonefur's tail flicks. "We need someone to look at Leopardstar -- you can use our herbs, of course, whatever you need."

Cinderpelt blinks. She's a young cat, Stonefur thinks, too young to be looking at him like she understands. Maybe it's part of being a medicine cat.

"Right then. Does Leopardstar know I'm coming?"

"Featherpaw is telling her."

and stonefur isn't going to follow cinderpelt into leopardstar's den.

for one, it's crowded enough, and he'd probably just get kicked out. for another, he doesn't know what leopardstar and cinderpelt will talk about, but -- he doesn't want to force himself into it.

cinderpelt stays for a while. sandstorm runs proxy, taking some herbs to her, but then she stays with cinderpelt. stonefur has probably been up for over a day when cinderpelt and sandstorm nod.

"take some prey before you leave," he says. "riverclan won't forget this."

"i went over some things with mistyfoot," cinderpelt says. "always good to have some basic herb knowledge."

cats don't have a direct analogue for kissing, but stonefur could kiss cinderpelt for having the grace to say that without letting on why. it's not like riverclan doesn't know. everyone knows.

but.

it's still appreciated.

As the sun rises, Stonefur stands, facing into Leopardstar's den.

"Can I come in?"

Her eyes are watching him. Even they have been changed: no longer the brilliant gold he remembers, but something brassy and dull.

"Of course."

Featherpaw slips past him, taking his place as sentry. She needs to sleep, Stonefur thinks, but it might be best to wait until she's too exhausted to keep her eyes open. He's not above carrying her back to her den like a kit.

Leopardstar starts to stand.

"Don't," Stonefur says. "It's alright."

He hates that seeing her like this is not foreign to him.

Mistyfoot curls up, her eyes closed, a compromise. Stonefur sinks to the ground. "Can I -- do anything?"

Leopardstar looks at the empty space in her nest. "Would you stay with me?"

"Of course." (Anything.)

yeah. uh. i think like. i dunno. it's not like tigerstar ever showed leopardstar a single ounce of kindness. so. uh. am i using that as an excuse to sidestep angst? no. no i am not. well. not entirely. but Damn leopardstar needs a hug.

that she can initiate and control.

but still. she's desperately deprived of positive human contact and as someone who cried once because someone put their hand on my shoulder and i hadn't touched another human being in like six months. i think she needs it.

ohh boy yeah. i think y'all know me well enough to know where i'd go with that angle.

so let me turn my attention to featherpaw. i started answering this ask like an hour ago. anon i love you.

featherpaw has. uh. she's got a Lot of problems. as you can probably understand.

i'd say let's start at the top, but i'm not sure where that is, so let's start with her relationship to stormpaw, because i think that should get fucked up. i think...you know how stormpaw says, "i won't let him kill us"? and. yeah.

but there's never One Moment here and stormpaw realizes way too late and featherpaw feels like...you know like. everyone who is supposed to help her is failing her. she can't really blame leopardstar, and mistyfoot clearly feels bad, and stonefur like. idk what he was doing but she's solidly neutral on him.

could tigerstar try to fuck all of that up? of course he could. do i want to write featherpaw and stonefur arguing about leopardstar? i've already written a lot of something blindingly similar, so not at the moment.

anyway. the relationship i will freely fuck with is stormpaw. i think not because of anything specific, i think tigerstar just gets in her head and she looks like her mother (something tigerstar brings up) and stormpaw takes after their father and he keeps acting like everything is normal and.

at the end of the day, there's this gulf between them that he keeps stepping into.

so yeah. not to mention greystripe. like. fuck.

"Featherpaw!" Greystripe waves his tail at his daughter, and she flinches.

oh hey i hit the grammar cut off again. let me. i learned how to do this okay i'm going to insert some kind of dummy image or something to reset the counter.

there it's a link to my tumblr but i've got grammar checking again xd

moving on.

featherpaw doesn't want to talk to greystripe. it's not Strictly that she thinks what tigerstar said was true (although she's not sure it isn't), but that. just looking at him sets off a loop in her head.

uh. does anyone explain this to greystripe? no. because the cats who could are:

leopardstar (doesn't want to talk about it)

mudfur (doesn't want to talk about it)

mistyfoot (but only by inference, and doesn't consider explaining things to greystripe a priority)

featherpaw (doesn't want to talk about it and doesn't want to talk to greystripe)

so yeah. no. he's in the Dark.

one of the first priorities is building leopardstar a new den. and decorating it. that's part of building a den i just wanted to clarify and.

featherpaw takes it seriously. because. you know. beauty begets beauty.

she doesn't want...stormpaw is ready to jump straight into sharing a den with old apprentice friend dawnpaw. maybe they never stopped.

but featherpaw? doesn't feel safe there. (doesn't feel safe anywhere.)

especially as she's getting older and tigerstar certainly implied and-

she's not sleeping very well.

mistyfoot and stonefur are trying to help her but they're not therapists! they don't know what to do! featherpaw clearly is dealing with shit but how do they help her??? they have no idea!!! how would they?

in a very strange inverse of canon, leopardstar and featherpaw develop a close relationship. leopardstar feels like she failed to protect featherpaw. featherpaw just. doesn't know. she doesn't know what she feels or thinks or knows and like: leopardstar doesn't. she doesn't need to explain herself to leopardstar.

she's in a big sister role to the kits, i think.

uh. yeah. featherpaw. she is not taking any of this well.

sooner or later greystripe corners her (because he doesn't know) and she's having a panic attack and leopardstar is like "you are never allowed to talk to her ever again" and greystripe is like "what the fuck did i do" and someone (mistyfoot?) finally explains.

uh. what else.

stonefur + leopardstar + featherpaw cuddle pile? leopardstar is in the centre. she feels kind of weird about that because she can tell featherpaw is like. going through this whole. uh. whats the. fuck.

like. featherpaw feels like she needs to protect her and leopardstar doesn't really want to encourage that but on the otherhand it's kind of nice that featherpaw is right here because tigerstar 100% used to threaten her to leopardstar and-

yeah.

uh.

i started writing two hours ago so i'm just going to post.

#ask #anon #mine #i approve of this au so much #clearly #had a lot of thoughts #debate au

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